Dearly Beloved
by Hikari1993
Summary: A year before the events of Birth by Sleep a young girl leaves her home to search for the princesses of heart.
1. Chapter 1

[Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix. All Disney characters belong to Disney. Toy Story belongs to Pixar and Disney.]

**Chapter 1**

Rain gently pattered against the windows of a small house in District 2 of Traverse Town as a teenage girl lay in bed. Open on her stomach was an old diary written in a language that she was struggling to comprehend. Juliet wasn't originally from Traverse Town, but when her home world that been taken by the darkness she'd somehow landed in the world meant for castaways. She flopped back down on her back letting the diary close as it still lay on her stomach; her mousy brown ponytail digging into the back of her head. Propped up next to the dresser was a large stick that Juliet used in back alley brawls in Traverse Town, but it never amounted to much damage on her account. _So far all I've found out is that there's some kind of weapon called a Keyblade, but that doesn't tell me much now does it._ Sitting up again Juliet opened the diary back up to where she'd left off. "After the Keyblade Wars the X-Blade was shattered into seven pure lights and thirteen darknesses. The one who finds the pure lights and merges them with the darkness will have the power of the X-Blade." She rested back on her palms and let the diary close again. "The power of some phenomenal weapon called the X-Blade…..what a load of bull." All though the story seemed to be a mere fantasy Juliet's interest was still roused and she found herself opening the diary again. _Why am I still looking through this old book? It's obvious that whoever wrote it has too much time on their hands. All though….I must admit it does make for a good story._ Sitting up in bed so that her back rested against the wall Juliet thumbed through a few more pages when she heard someone knock at her door. "I'll be right there."

Standing outside Juliet's door was a tall man with long black hair streaked with red with a bright pair of crimson eyes. His skin was sallow and stretched tightly over his angular cheekbones making him look older then he actually was and quiet ill at the same time. His arms and legs were long and boney beneath a dark robe that he was wearing. In face the only thing about this man that seemed to be alive were his bright eyes. He saw Juliet open and door and gave her a little smile that suggested he might be hiding something. "Young lady, I was wondering if you could spare pity for a weary traveler. You see I've been on the road longer then I care to admit and am in need of some much needed rest."

Juliet shrugged and opened the door a little wider. "This world is made up of weary travelers like yourself feel free to come in." She stepped to the side to allow the man in feeling a little curious about where he'd come from. All though she didn't like to admit it Juliet had always been curious about the outside worlds after she'd been forced to flee from hers at such a young age." She sat down at the little table in the middle of the room, but not before pulling out a chair of the stranger. "Are you hungry? I could get you something to eat if you like."

"Oh, no, but thank you for your hospitality. I just need a quiet place to regain my strength." Looking around the house the man's eyes finally landed on the diary that was still on the bed, but he quickly averted his gaze. He looked back at Juliet to get a better look at her. She didn't look like a threat in her purple tank top and dark pants in fact she just looked like an average resident of Traverse Town and none of them looked particularly special either. "May I ask for the young lady's name who so graciously allowed me into her home?"

Juliet had also been looking the man over, but was snapped out of her thoughts at the sound of his rather hypnotic voice. "Oh, my name?" She saw him quirk an eyebrow; a ghost of a smile playing on his lips. "It's Juliet. What's yours?"

The man chuckled softly under his breath as his gaze drifted back to the diary on the bed. "My name is Erik, Miss Juliet." This time he allowed her to notice that his attention was on the diary. "Do you think you could tell me how you came across such an old book? Its not often that such a young person is interested in old literature."

"Oh, that? When I left my home world it was in my things." Deciding it would be all right to trust Erik; Juliet walked over to the bed and picked the diary up before walking back to the table. She flipped it open to a random page and let herself gaze fondly at the weather beaten pages. "I think someone was trying to write a fantasy story or something. All its about is something called the Keyblade Wars, the X-Blade, and these seven pure lights and thirteen darknesses. It doesn't make any since to me, but I still like to have it around. Reminds me of home you know?"

Erik gestured at the diary. "Do you mind if I take a look at it? Something about the Keyblade Wars is ringing a bell with me. All though I'm sure you're right and someone just had an over active imagination." He accepted the book as it was slid across the table and he began to thumb through it. Erik's eyes widened a bit as he continued to glance over the pages; this was exactly what he'd been looking for. "Juliet, are you from originally from this town?"

Juliet hadn't quiet expected a reaction like that and shook her head. "No, I'm not from here, but before you ask where I'm from I have to tell you now that I couldn't tell you that because I don't remember. I was really young when I left home." She saw him giving her a concerned look.

"Tell me what you remember."

In though Juliet leaned back in her chair. She wanted to trust this man. There was something about him that made her feel at ease, but at the same time those bright eyes were a little creepy. "I don't remember much, but there were a lot of bubbles around for some reason and I remember bouncing on the bubbles. My Mom got mad at me because she thought I'd hurt myself." Juliet wove her fingers together and let her chin rest on them. "Sorry, that's all I remember."

"You don't remember where you got this diary?"

"No, it was in my things when I got here."

Erik leaned forward so that he could whisper to Juliet. "Have you ever thought about trying to find your way home?" He saw her look back at him. That had gotten her attention. "Because if you're willing to help me with a little issue I'll help you find your way home."

Juliet leaned back in her chair again. "Sure, I'll help you. What's there to lose?"She saw him smile in relief.

"Excellent." Erik began to flip through the diary until he came to the page he'd been looking for. "Do you remember reading about the seven pure lights and the thirteen darknesses?" He saw her nod. "Well, my boss has decided that he wants to know more about these lights and has sent me out to look for them. Trouble is that I don't even know where to start, but you have this diary so maybe you know something that I don't."

"Sorry, I haven't come across anything that says where they are. You can borrow the diary if you want to."

"Not exactly what I was thinking. You want to see other worlds right?" Erik saw her nod again. "Well, I was thinking that you could go looking for these lights for me and in the processes you could see other worlds." Erik expected for Juliet to ignore his idea and was surprised to see her look excited at the idea. "Is that a yes to my plan?"

"Of course I'll go. I've wanted to get out of this town almost as soon as I got here." Juliet got up from her chair. "So, when I do leave?" She saw Erik blink a couple of times before sitting back down. "Does this mean I'm not going to get to leave after all?"

"Oh no I'll send you. Just not yet. First I need to give you some things that will help you on your journey." He saw that Juliet was still looking very excited. "Not yet though just calm down. I'll see you in the morning." Erik got up from the table and began to walk back towards the door. "Don't forget now."

Juliet watched Erik leave the house before seizing the diary and throwing herself down on the bed. How could she sleep with this buzzing in her head? This strange man had just appeared out of nowhere and offered her a way to get home in exchange for helping him on some wild goose chase. _Who cares if it's a wild goose chase I might actually have a chance of getting home and finding out what happened to everyone._ She fell into an uneasy sleep that night; her dreams filled a bright eyed stranger.

Early the next morning Juliet woke up to find that it was still lightly sprinkling outside. She hurried out of bed and took a quick shower before dressing in a purple tank top with stitching up the sides, a black tank top on under that, black pants, and boots that went up to her knees; her mousy brown hair was tied back in a ponytail once again. Juliet ran around the small house packing a bag while eating a piece of toast. _Don't know when I'll be back. Might as well back a bag for a couple of weeks._ The sound of someone knocking on her door nearly sent Juliet into a panic. "I'll be there in just a minute." As she pulled the door open Juliet was a little disappointed to see a little dark haired girl standing outside her house. "Oh, Wendy, I didn't expect to see you here." She crouched down so that she would be eye to eye with the little girl. "Why are you here by yourself? Won't your Mom and Dad be worried?"

Wendy shook her head and stood up on her tip toes to get a better look at Juliet when she saw the bag next to the wall. "Are you going on a trip, Juliet?" The little girl had always idolized Juliet and if the older girl was going somewhere Wendy wanted in on it. "Do you think I could go with you?"

Juliet could see Erik walking towards her and wanted to get on her way as quickly as possible. "I'm sorry Wendy. This is a trip that only I can go on." She saw the little girl stick her lower lip out in a pout. "I promise to bring you back something fun. Now, why don't you go home? Your parents are probably worried sick."

Erik watched the dejected little girl trudge past him before walking toward Juliet. "Who was that? Your sidekick?" He could see the bag propped up against the wall. "You sure are excited aren't you?" He reached into his cloak and pulled out a couple of items. "First a map of how to get to the worlds." Erik handed her the old dirty piece of paper. "Second here's your way of getting around." He pulled out what looked like a set of armor, but it was only the arm. "Lastly, a weapon."

Looking at the keychain that had been dropped into her hands Juliet only saw a card with a chain attached to it. "How am I supposed to use this as a weapon?"

"It will show itself when you need it. Now, I suggest you study that map." Erik began to walk off when he felt Juliet throw her arms around him.

"Thank you…..Thank you for giving me this chance to get home."

Erik was a little taken aback at Juliet's reaction and patted her head. "All right….your welcome. Now, let go of me." He sighed in relief as he felt Juliet release him and gestured at the armor. "You'll want to put that on." He picked it up and fitted it to her arm where it clasped itself to her bare skin. "That won't come off easily either just so you know. To activate it just press the button at the top."

Juliet looked down at her armor and when she looked up again Erik had disappeared. _Wonder where he went. I was going to ask him where to go first._ She looked back down at the map before closing her eyes and pointing at one of the worlds. When she opened her eyes she saw that her finger had landed on one called Andy's Room. _I guess I'm going to Andy's Room first. Where ever that is._ Juliet took in a deep breath before she began to walk towards the exit of Traverse Town.


	2. Chapter 2

A few hours later Juliet was waking up after crashing in the strange distant world called Andy's Room. She remembered the keychain turning into a glider and trying to fly though space when she thought she'd gone off track and ended up crashing. Juliet propped herself up when she saw a monstrous bed towering over her. _Is this world inhabited by giants?_ She could hear a voice coming from the top of the bed and began to pull on the sheets. "Hey, is anyone up there?"

Peering over the edge of the bed was a man wearing a cowboy hat with a sheriff badge pinned to his vest. "Who are you? Are you one of Molly's toys because you don't look like one of Andy's."

Juliet shook her head. "I don't know who that is. Do you think you could help me get up where you are?" She saw the man disappear back over the bed again before reappearing with a ladder that looked like it was made of red monkeys. Juliet grabbed onto the last monkey and began to climb up the ladder. Looking around the room she noticed that the walls of the room were painted light blue with clouds and were covered with drawings of the man in the cowboy hat. "Can I assume that you're not Andy, but isn't this Andy's Room?"

"Yes, this is Andy's Room." The man held his hand out to Juliet. "I'm Woody. Who are you?"

"I'm Juliet and this is going to sound crazy, but I'm not from around here and I was wondering if-" She was cut off by the sound of kids racing up the stairs and felt Woody clap a hand over her mouth.

"Get back down under the bed Andy is coming."

Juliet quickly hopped down from the bed and rolled under it. She saw the flurry of feet passing around the bed when she heard a cough behind her. Looking back she saw Erik sitting cross legged under the bed. "What are you doing here, Erik?"

"There were just a couple details I left out when I talked to you last."

"What kind of details?"

"That there are monsters lurking in these worlds." Erik saw the skeptical look on Juliet's face. "They're called Wraiths and there are seven main kinds that will be in the worlds. There's the Sloth Mole, Anger Dog, Pride Elephant, Envy Monkey, Lust Snake, Gluttony Pig, and Greed Parrot." He saw that she still looked skeptical and sighed under his breath. "I wouldn't worry about them too much in this world. This world is the room of a young boy whose heart is still pure, but his neighbor might be a problem. I'd avoid the neighbor if I were you."

"Juliet, it's safe to come out now."

Juliet looked back at Erik before beginning to crawl out from under the bed. "I'll keep an eye out for those….Wraiths you call them, but I'm going to go explore this world now." She crawled out from under the bed when another thought came to her. "I was just wondering how exactly will I know that there's a pure heart around?"

Erik quirked an eyebrow in thought. "You'll feel warm all over it will be pretty obvious that they're one of the seven pure ones."

"And the thirteen darknesses?"

"That's something I'm not so sure of. As far as I know only the seven lights have made an appearance so far. The darknesses are still hiding somewhere."

Juliet crawled out from under the bed the rest of the way, but saw no rope of red monkeys waiting for her. "Hey Woody, what's going on up there?" Juliet grabbed onto the bed sheets and began to pull herself up to see that Woody wasn't on the bed anymore and had been replaced with a strange looking man in a rocket ship box. _This place is strange. I wonder what happened to Woody._ She peered down over the edge of bed at the others that were starting to reappear from their hiding places, but felt nothing particularly warm coming from any of them. Juliet heard Woody gasping as he reappeared under the bed and leaned down. "What are you doing down there?"

"It was an accident nothing to worry about."

Juliet walked to the foot of the bed and hopped onto the desk to look out the window. Looking down in the driveway she saw what looked like a brightly colored parrot and a little scruffy black dog going down the street. _I wonder if those are the Wraiths that Erik was talking about._ _Maybe I should go check it out sooner rather than later. _Juliet saw the Wraiths going towards the neighbor's house. _Looks like they're coming from that neighbor's house. _She turned her attention back to the weird man who was now out of the box and cocked her head to the side. Juliet could hear Woody talking the stranger, but wasn't paying attention. _I think I will go after them. Where are those monkeys?_ Juliet walked back over to Woody and tapped his shoulder, but was unable to get his attention until she pulled his pull string.

"Someone poisoned the water supply." Woody turned back to Juliet. "Oh, sorry forgot you were here." He looked back at the stranger from the corner of his eye and didn't look too excited, but said through gritted teeth. "Juliet, this is Buzz Lightyear. He's Andy's newest toy."

"Pleased to meet your, madam."

Juliet cocked her head in confusion at Buzz unable to figure out what he was thinking. "Woody, do you think you could help me out for a minute?"

"Sure Juliet what do you need?" Woody could hear laughter coming from the neighbor and he dashed over to the desk to look out the window. "Oh, no Sid's at it again."

Following the rest of the toys to the window Juliet looked out to see a tall boy with short black hair wearing a black tee shirt and jeans in his back yard holding something. At his feet was what looked like a toy soldier with something strapped to its back. "What's he doing with that soldier?"

"Oh, I can't watch." Said a green dinosaur toy.

Juliet got up on her tip toes to look around a girl in pink dress and a matching bonnet just to see the boy blow the soldier up. Lurking in the bushes she could see more of the scruffy black dogs; smoke coming from their bodies. "Why would he do something like that to a toy?"

Woody was still standing at the window sill while the other toys had begun to disperse. "Because that's what Sid does. He blows up his toys. Anyway, what was it that you needed?"

"There's something I need to investigate over at that boy's house."

"At Sid's? You can't go to Sid's house. That's where toys go to die."

"Yeah, I guess you're right, but I'm not a toy." She saw that Woody still didn't look like he was willing to send her over to Sid's. "Look I'll be fine I promise. This is really important all you need to do is lower me down into the yard with some of those monkeys."

A few minutes later Woody had made another rope out of monkeys that were hanging out the window sill. "Are you sure you have to go to Sid's house to investigate whatever this is?"

"No, I think Sid's house is the place to be." Juliet began to shimmy down the rope when she realized that it was quiet short. _I guess I'll just drop into the bushes._ Taking a deep breath Juliet let go of the rope and landed in the bushes. She struggled to crawl out of the bushes and tripped several times before successfully getting out. Juliet dashed across the small yard just in time to get inside as Sid was shutting the door. Looking around the house she climbed into a potted plant to try and get a better look around not noticing the presence of a little girl with bobbed black hair wearing a pink tee shirt.

"Oh, you're pretty." The little girl said before she picked Juliet up out of the plant. "When did I get you? You don't look like one of Sid's toy. Come on I'll show you my room um…..Mrs. Connors."

Juliet thought it best not to struggle against the girl's grip and instead glanced around the house the best she could without being noticed. From the corner of her eye she saw more of the familiar scruffy black dogs and another heavily jeweled parrot going towards the stairs. _I guess Sid's room is where the Wraiths are coming from._

A few minutes later Juliet found herself in a pink wallpapered room wearing a pink apron and a hat while sitting at a table accompanied by headless dolls. _Little girl probably didn't do something like that to her own dolls. Sid probably got his hands on them._ A new thought came to her at that moment. _I wonder if maybe that Sid kid is under the influence of the Wraiths. If he is under their influence then that would explain his behavior. _She felt the girl push another cup of tea towards her lips. _I need to get into Sid's room to see where the source of the Wraiths is coming from._

She waited until the girl left the room before slipping off the apron and hat and getting out from behind the table. _Now's my chance to get to Sid's room._ Very quietly Juliet tip toed out of the room to find that she was at the top of a set of stairs, but at the bottom was a sleeping dog. _Probably want to stay quiet so that dog doesn't wake up._ As Juliet approached the door to Sid's room she found that it was shut and was unable to reach the door knob, but could hear scratching coming from the inside of the room. _I bet the Wraiths are in Sid's room. They must be what's making the scratching noise._ She had to back up when the door opened to reveal Sid.

Sid saw Juliet sitting on the floor and leaned down to pick her up. "Stupid Hannah, leaving her dolls around. I guess I can use you for something." He tossed her back into his room and shut the door behind him.

Juliet heard something about Sid going to a place called Pizza Planet, but didn't move until she heard the front door close behind him. She got up from the floor and looked around the room only noticing how dark it was. "I wonder where those Wraiths are lurking not that I have a weapon with me." It was then that she remembered the keychain that Erik had given her. "Maybe that's what he meant when he said it will be a weapon when I need it to be." She heard a scuffling sound behind her and went rigid. "Come on out Wraith I' not afraid of you."

Instead of seeing a black dog or a jeweled parrot Juliet saw a strange looking toy that was mostly a metal spider body with a baby doll head on it. "Oh, I'm sorry I thought you were a monster." She didn't hear the toy respond and cocked her head to the side. "Can't you speak?"

The toy rose up on its spindly legs and crept towards Juliet until something darted out in front of it.

An Anger Dog had run between Juliet and the spider toy; its tail was up, its hackles were raised, and its mouth was open in a snarl.

Juliet reached into her pocket and pulled out the keychain only to see that it was still just a keychain. "Why won't it do anything else?" She had to jump backwards when the Wraith sprung at her; her eyes shut tightly. She only opened her eyes when she heard a whistle and when she opened her eyes again saw that something was now attached to the keychain.

The blade was iron grey, long, and curled in on itself instead of coming out into a blade. On the hilt were darker grey feathers and at the end of the hilt was the keychain.

Striking her arm out Juliet hit the Anger Dog across the muzzle with the blade sending it sailing across the room. "What's going on? What kind of weapon is this? It looks a little like a sword, but it has no blade." Juliet swung the strange sword again hitting a Greed Parrot in the beak and sending it cawing angrily out the window. "I was right. The Wraiths are coming from Sid's room." She still held the blade out expecting to see more Wraiths when she heard clapping and looked behind her to see Erik standing next to the door. "You could have told me that Wraiths were here."

"You figured that out for yourself I didn't need to tell you anything." Erik gestured at the blade that Juliet still held. "Do you know what kind of weapon you possess?" He saw her shake her head. "It's called a Keyblade and to honest I wasn't sure you'd be able to use it. Only certain people are allowed to wield such a blade. You should feel very lucky that it came to your aid." Erik walked closer to Juliet and took the Keyblade from her ignoring the sharp sting that went through his hand. "This particular Keyblade is called End of Tears." He passed it back to her. "As I said be grateful that it came to your aid."

Juliet was feeling a little nervous around Erik for some reason and backed away from him when she heard growling. "Did you hear that?"

"They're coming." Erik got in front of Juliet and put his arm up to block her way. "I'll deal with it this once. You go and hide."

Instead of running and hiding Juliet pulled the Keyblade back out. "I'll take it on. Don't worry about me. I need to learn to protect myself sooner rather than later."

Coming out of the shadows was a large monster that was shaped like a pig with giant tusks protruding from his mouth; its eyes were bright red with thick rings around them, drool was hanging out of its fangs, and it was pawing angrily at the ground.

Erik tapped on Juliet's wrist lightly. "I've given you the ability to use fire magic. That's all the help I will give you if you truly don't wish for my help."

Juliet took a hesitant step forward with the Keyblade raised. "I think I can take a big pig out on my own." She smacked it once on the nose prompting an angry snarl. "Come on pig don't leave me hanging like this."

The pig snarled again and dove at Juliet with a roar flinging its tusked head about. It swung its head about again nearly knocking Juliet off her feet and dove forward again only to embed one of its tusks in the wall. The pig let out a loud growl and struggled to pull its stuck tusk from the wall, but only succeeded in sticking it in deeper. The beast was roused again by being hit hard on the back with the Keyblade.

Knocking the beast in the head again Juliet was unable to find a weak spot until she heard a whisper in her ear.

"Aim for the heart."

Deciding it would be best to listen to the whisper Juliet got down on her hands and knees to crawl under the giant pig. Rolling onto her back she thrust the Keyblade up into the beast's heart. She felt the warm gush of thick black blood splash onto her face and heard the pig give out a low guttural moan before it collapsed onto its side. Juliet rolled out from under the pig's legs and sat up. "Well, that defiantly could have gone worse." Now that she thought about it she hadn't found any of the seven pure lights in this world. "Maybe there isn't any in this world. I guess its time for me to move on." She pressed the button on her armor and was soon incased in the rest of her armor.


	3. Chapter 3

[A/N: Huzzah for the first author's note. You might notice that this chapter is a tad shorter than the previous two and that's mostly because I couldn't figure out much to happen. Anyway reviews are appreciated. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix.]

When Juliet landed in the next world her landing went a lot smoother; the glider barely touching the cobblestone streets as she glided down. As she dismounted from the glider she felt a strange warmth spreading through her chest. Juliet looked around the small town square that she'd landed into see a little girl with shoulder length red hair wearing a white apron like dress with purple and white skirt on under it. _I wonder if she's one of the seven pure lights. I feel the warmth that Erik was telling about. She must be one of them. _She saw the little girl walk past towards an old woman.

"Kairi, there you are. I've been looking for you." Said the old woman as she draped an arm over the little girl. "I suppose you want to hear that story again wouldn't you?" The old woman saw Kairi nod her head eagerly. "All right once more then. Years ago there once was light everywhere. Soon people began to fight over the light and thus darkness was created. All though the darkness spread though out the worlds light still exists in the hearts of children everywhere."

Juliet could feel her heart begin to beat in excitement at the familiar story. _This girl is defiantly one of the pure lights. She just has to be. Oh, I can't wait to tell Erik. That's one down and six to go._ She pulled the map out of her pocket and unfolded it to see where she'd landed. _Looks like I'm in Radiant Garden. What luck would I have if the rest of the lights in this world too._ Juliet looked up away from the town to see a large castle looming over the tiny village. _Might as well see if anyone in the castle knows anything about the rest of the pure lights._

As Juliet made her way towards the castle she heard rooting under her feet and looked down to see a black head pop out from under the stone and look up at her with beady eyes. "Oh, that's nice there are Wraiths here too." She put her foot on the Sloth Mole's head in the attempt to push it back down when she heard it squeal in anger; its teeth sinking into her boot. "I guess now would be a good time to use that magic that Erik taught me…..but how do I use it?"

The Sloth Mole unburied itself from the stone to reveal two shovel like paws. It snarled at Juliet and began to crawl forward using its paws.

Juliet pulled out the Keyblade and held it out in front of her pointing at the Wraith. A small ball of fire shot out of the tip and hit the Sloth Mole in the nose sending it rolling back across the street. A few swipes with the Keyblade later and the Sloth Mole rolled onto its back before disappearing into vapor. After the Keyblade disappeared back into its keychain form Juliet looked back up at the castle. _I wonder who's in that castle._

As Juliet walked towards the castle she saw three children walking down the street accompanied by a tall man with a toothpick hanging out of his mouth. Two of the children were girls; one with short black hair and the other with long brown hair with a pink ribbon. The boy had longish brown hair and a perpetual scowl. Juliet heard the names Yuffie, Aerith, and Leon for the children and something about old man Cid for the man. _ I wonder if they know anything about the seven lights or thirteen darknesses. _She walked over to Cid. "Excuse me sir, do you know anything about seven pure lights?"

Cid looked down at Juliet and pulled the toothpick from his mouth. "Huh? What's that kid? What's that about light? Don't know what you're talking about, kid." He began to walk away when the girl named Aerith pulled at his sleeve.

"Don't you remember the story that Kairi's Grandma is always telling, Cid?"

"Aerith, you can't be serious. That story is just make believe."

"No it's not Cid," Piped up Yuffie. "Kairi's Grandma says that light still exists in the hearts of children. So, we still have lights in our hearts."

Juliet watched Cid put the toothpick back in his mouth and shake his head in disbelief. "Never mind….I'll be on my way."

On the rest of the way to the castle Juliet encountered more Wraiths, but easily dispatched them. As she approached the gateway of the castle Juliet saw two men guarding the entrance. One of the men had long dreadlocked hair in a ponytail with massive sideburns while the other was bulky and large with short red hair. Juliet walked up to the two men trying to keep a natural look on her face. "Excuse me gentleman, but do you think I could go into the castle?"

"No you may not." Was the answer from the stocky red haired man.

Juliet sighed under her breath and turned to begin walking away when she saw a group of Wraiths coming up the stairs. "Oh, great more Wraiths." When she went forward the man with the dreadlocks pulled her back.

"We'll take care of them."

She watched the two men run forward to attack the Wraiths when an idea came to her. Making sure that they were both fully involved with the Wraiths Juliet reached up and grabbed onto the handle of the massive doors and using all her body weight managed to open the door. Dropping down from the outside handle Juliet had to jump back up to the inside handle and swing for a few seconds to get the door closed again behind her. Turning to look into bowels of the castle Juliet saw only a series of dark turning halls. _I wonder where I am anyway._ She reached into her back pocket and pulled out the map. Tracing the route from Andy's Room with her finger in the direction that she'd gone and landed on a world called Radiant Garden. _Radiant Garden….it has one of the pure lights._

As Juliet continued to walk through the winding halls she heard the sound of footsteps and voices coming towards her. She quickly darted around a corner and peeked around it to see a tall man with long blond hair wearing a red scarf walking down the hall.

The man took a minute to stop walking before he pulled out a bar of light blue ice cream. "I do wonder why my apprentices have been so persistent with pursuing the studies of darkness." He licked the ice cream once before resuming his walk down the hall.

_So this man knows something about the darkness. I think I'll ask him if he knows anything about the thirteen darknesses. _Juliet walked after the man, but found that this was a little difficult because of his long strides. "Excuse me sir, did I you say something about knowing about the darkness?"

The man looked down at Juliet. "Why would a young lady want to know about the darkness?" A new thought came to the man since he didn't remember letting Juliet in before. "How did you get inside my castle in the first place?"

Juliet felt her face go pale. "Well, that's a funny story. You see I wanted to see if you knew anything about the seven pure lights and the thirteen darknesses." She saw the man's face go the color of old milk. "Is there something wrong?"

"How do you know about the seven lights and the thirteen darknesses?"

Deciding to leave out the part about Erik, Juliet told the man about the diary and how she was trying to get back to her home world. "By the way who are you?" She asked finally at the end of the story.

"I am called Ansem the Wise, and I'm not sure if I believe the story you told me, but I feel like I should help you at least." Ansem began to walk back in the direction that he'd come from. "Come with me child. I shall tell you what I know about the darkness."

As they entered a room with a large computer in it Juliet watched Ansem walk over to the computer and begin typing something when the door opened up again after them. Ansem looked over to see another tall man with blond hair, but this man was wearing a white lab coat with a purple ascot. "Evan, what's the matter?"

"Sir, I've lost Ienzo again. I think he's wandered back into the town."

"I'll be there in a moment, Evan." Ansem turned back to Juliet blocking the computer from her view. "I'll be back in a few moments, child. Just stay here."

Waiting until Ansem had left the room Juliet walked over to the computer and looked down at the screen, but was unable to make out anything that was on it. _Its times like this I wish I was better with technology. _She began typing on the keyboard not noticing the beam of the light that was behind her. Juliet turned around just in time to see the beam of light aim at her.


	4. Chapter 4

[A/N: Another short chapter, but a new character is introduced. As always Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix.]

When Juliet came too she found that she was lying on her stomach in a very strange black and blue world. She got to her knees and looked around. "Where did I land? I wonder if maybe I'm in the computer." Getting up Juliet looked down to see that she was wearing a black one piece skin tight outfit with blue bands of light on it. "This is bizarre. How did I get in the computer and what happened to my clothes?" Now on her feet Juliet was still unable to figure out where she was, but it looked like she was in a hanger of some kind. "I guess the only thing I can do is take a look around."

As Juliet walked around the strange computerized world she saw nobody, but it sounded like someone was following her. She let the Keyblade form in her hand and without looking back called out "whoever you are I know you're following me." This time Juliet turned quickly on her heel and thrust the Keyblade into the face of the person who'd been following her.

The person who'd been following Juliet was wearing clothes similar to her, but where hers was blue the other person's was red and they wore a helmet. The person went to take a step forward when they found Juliet's Keyblade in their face.

"Don't come any closer. I'm warning you I'm armed." She took a couple steps back still with the Keyblade outstretched. Juliet began to back away from the person while making sure that her Keyblade didn't leave the vicinity of his face. "That's right….don't follow me." She lowered the Keyblade ever so slightly. "Why don't you take that goofy helmet off?"

"My helmet?" This was the first time the person had spoken. "I can't take my helmet off. Can't you tell that I'm a guard?"

"What kind of guard?"

"One of Clu's guards of course." The person could see the confused look on Juliet's face through the helmet. "Don't tell me you don't know who Clu is."

Juliet let the Keyblade leave the person's face. "I don't even know where I am. I was in this place called Radiant Garden in Ansem the Wise's castle. Then there was this beam of light and I woke up here."

The person took a step towards Juliet prompting her to take a step back and raise the Keyblade again. "This is The Grid. How do you not know about The Grid?"

"I'm not from around here. Like I said I was in this place called Radiant Garden and then I came here to…The Grid you call it. Now, are you going to take that helmet off?"

"Fine, fine if it will make you feel more comfortable." The person reached up and removed their helmet. The person under the helmet was a boy with short dark hair; a bit fell right in his face. He looked about sixteen or seventeen years old; too young to be a guard to anything. "Do you feel better now?"

Juliet instead thrust the Keyblade back in the boy's face. "All right I can see your face now and I'm expecting you to show me the way out of this place. "

The boy backed away from the Keyblade not really feeling comfortable with having it thrust in his face. "Would you please stop doing that? Besides if I'm going to take you anywhere it would be to Clu. So, if you don't mind could you please come with me?" When the boy reached out to take Juliet by the wrist he was smacked on the top of the head by the Keyblade.

_Maybe I'm going about this all the wrong way. He could know something about the seven lights. It would probably be a good idea to butter him up a little._ Juliet had the Keyblade disappear and she tucked the keychain back into her pocket. "I'm sorry about that. You just startled me." She held her hand out to the boy. "My name's Juliet. What's yours?"

The boy hesitantly took Juliet's hand and shook it. "My name is Akio. I'm curious about something Juliet. Are you a program or a user?"

"I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that, but since I'm not from here I think I'm a user."

Akio suddenly looked excited. "If you're a user then maybe you know my user." His smile slipped a notch. "Oh, but this is going to be difficult. You see I don't know who my user is and-"

"I don't know what you're talking about." Juliet began to walk away when the thought came to her that she didn't know where she was, but the boy did. "Look I don't know where I am, but I do know you so do you know what this world is called?"

"Oh, the name of our world?" Akio didn't look at all puzzled at hearing such a question. "This is The Grid. We're actually neighbors with another computer world called Space Paranoids, but I've never been there." All though he looked a little nervous about whatever idea had come to him Akio still looked determined. "I could take you there if you like. Since you're a user you have no use to Clu. What are you doing here anyway?"

Juliet hadn't heard of anyone with such a strange name, but brushed it off. "Akio, is there something that you've always wanted to do?"

Akio crossed his arms and was silent in thought for a few seconds. "I'd like to meet my user even though I don't know who they are. Why do you ask?"

"Well, the reason I'm here is because I'm trying to get back to my home world."

"How is being in The Grid going to help you get back to your home world? You said you weren't from here."

"I don't think this is going to help me directly, but…." Juliet bit her lip while trying to figure out if she should tell Akio about her mission to find the seven lights. "Can I tell you something? Mind you this is probably going to sound crazy, but you might be able to help me. You know if you willing that is."

Akio quirked an eyebrow. "What do you need help with?"

Juliet whistled under her breath and kicked at the ground with the toe of her shoe. "So, as you know I'm not from here, but I'm also not from the world that I lived in either. I met this man in the world that I was living in and he told me that if I helped him that he'd get me back to my home world."

"Well that sounds fine, but what does he need you to do?"

"You see that's the problem. He needs me to find these seven pure lights that are scattered among the worlds. I think I found one of them already in the Radiant Garden, but I don't even know where to start to find the rest of them; and I was wondering if you could help me."

There was a little glimmer of interest in Akio's eyes at the mention of leaving The Grid. He'd never been out of the computer world and had been longing to see something that wasn't blue and black for the longest time although he'd never admit it. "Sure….yeah I think I could help you out. To be honest I'm actually really interested in seeing other worlds I just haven't gotten the opportunity to leave The Grid."

Juliet was feeling so excited that she was bouncing on the balls of her feet. "You mean it?" She Akio nod his head and had to hold in a squeal. "Oh, you don't know how relieved I am. I thought I'd have to go on this journey all by myself. This is going to be so much easier. So, how do we get out of here?"

Akio began to walk over to the hanger were a control panel sat. "If you come with me I can take you to another world where we could start looking for those lights." He walked over to the control panel and pressed a few buttons which ushered in two beams of light.

Peering over Akio's shoulder Juliet found that this was another one of the moments where she wished she knew more about technology. "So all you did was press a couple of those buttons and….." She saw something moving in the darkness on the other side of the hanger. "You stay here I'll be right back." Making sure that Akio was distracted with the control panel Juliet walked over to the other side of the hanger and she wasn't surprised to see a jeweled Greed Parrot accompanied by a monstrous Pride Elephant with long sloping tusks that glistened in the faint electronic light of The Grid. Looking up at the elephant Juliet readied her Keyblade. "Never seen one of you before."

The Pride Elephant saw Juliet from the corner of one of its beady little eyes and swung its long trunk at her in a blind rage. When it missed the elephant swerved around and flung its trunk out again this time catching her in the stomach.

As she fell off the elephant's trunk Juliet fell hard on her back; the Keyblade clattering out of her hand. Juliet scrambled backwards as the elephant began to stamp towards her and was just barely able to beat the Greed Parrot away as it began pecking at her head. She saw the elephant's foot above her and held the Keyblade up to stab it when she saw a disk flying through the air and striking the elephant in the eye. Juliet turned around in time to see the disk return to Akio's hand.

Akio walked over to Juliet and offered his hand to her. "You need help up?" He took her hand and pulled her up. "You all right? What were those things anyway?"

"I'm fine." Juliet tucked the keychain back into her pocket. "Those are called Wraiths. The man who sent me to look for the lights told me that Wraiths will be lurking in every world that I visit. I'm not sure what they are exactly, but they're pretty nasty so you will want to watch out for them."

"That's good to know. Well, I got the portal open whenever you're ready."


	5. Chapter 5

[A/N: This chapter is a bit longer then the past two so please enjoy it. Thank you to all who read and favorite this story. Reviews are read and appreciated.]

As they stepped out of the portals into the new world Juliet noticed that her clothes had stayed relatively the same expect they were a lighter blue. Akio's outfit had also changed from red and black to orange and grey. "Do you know where we are?" They would really be in a pickle if they had landed in a place and didn't know where they were.

_Then again I've landed in worlds before and not known where I am._ Juliet looked around the room that they'd landed in and saw stripes on the sides of the doorway signaling that a barrier used to be there. In the corner was a big yellow computer. _Oh great more computers._

Akio looked around the room that they had entered not being as familiar with this world as The Grid. "I believe we're in the neighboring world of The Grid." He heard Juliet sigh heavily. "This is Space Paranoids if I'm thinking correctly."

Juliet zeroed in on the exit of the room and began to walk out when she noticed that Akio was staring after her. "What? You think I'm going to take you with me or something?" She saw him nod his head feverously. "Sorry but, I just can't do that."

"Why not?" Akio hastily followed Juliet who was already out in the hallway going up to an elevator. "I saved you back there. Don't you think you owe me something?" Instead Akio watched Juliet get onto the platform and had to jump onto it himself in order to keep from being left behind. "Are you even listening to me?"

"Not particularly." Juliet looked down into the deep abyss beneath the platform and hastily backed up. "I'm taking you with me and that's that. I don't owe you anything." She could feel him staring at her back. "I'm on a journey and I don't think you'd want to get mixed up with what I'm doing."

"How do you know? I could be an asset for all you know."

"I highly doubt that." Juliet hadn't been told that it would be ok for her to get help from anyone and until she heard that it was she was content to continue on by herself. "I just needed to know where I am and now that I know that you can leave." As the platform reached its destination Juliet hopped off quickly followed by Akio. "Why don't you just go home?"

Akio winced at what Clu would have planned for him if he showed up without the _prisoner_. "I can't go home now."

"How come?"

"I'm supposed to bring you with me." Akio saw Juliet raise an eyebrow. "You were an unwelcome user in The Grid and since I'm a guard I was suppose to bring you to Clu and I didn't so now I'm in trouble."

Juliet sighed under her breath and stopped walking. "I guess if you don't know anywhere to go it wouldn't be right of me to turn you away." She turned around and pointed a finger at his chest. "I'm telling you now if you come with me you need to be able to keep up." At that moment a familiar mole looking Wraith stuck its head out of the ground prompting Juliet to step on it sending it back down into the ground. "I guess the Wraiths are in this world too." She could see movement coming from around the corner and took a few cautious steps forward.

Standing on the other side of the wall was a boy wearing not a blue or red skin tight uniform, but normal clothes that you might find in Traverse Town or Radiant Garden. The boy saw Juliet and Akio and waved merrily at them before he turned his back and began to walk away.

"I got a bad feeling about this." Akio muttered to himself noticing that Juliet wasn't paying any attention to him. "When you're in a world like The Grid of Space Paranoids you're suppose to look like us. When you don't there's some bad going on." He saw Juliet begin to walk after the boy. "I don't think it's a good idea to follow him, Juliet."

Ignoring Akio, Juliet continued to walk after the boy until she came to a fork in the road. One path led to another lift and the other to a closed off room. She pointed at the lift. "You go that way I'll go the other way." Not waiting for an answer she went off in the direction of the sealed off doors leaving Akio behind.

When Juliet walked through the doors she found herself in a bright green room with a giant screen in front of her. _Well, I guess he's not in here._ As she turned around she came face to face with the boy she'd been looking for. "Um hi,…."

The boy didn't say anything, but smiled back. He had a hand behind his back.

Juliet looked around the brightly colored room not noticing what was behind the boy's back. "You don't look like you're from around here. Where are you from?" She saw something dark creeping up behind the boy and readied her Keyblade. "There's something behind you."

The boy raised an eyebrow at the sight of the Keyblade his smile growing ever so slightly. He tossed whatever was behind him past Juliet and out into the room. He then sprung forward and until he was nose to nose with Juliet. "You're not getting out of here so easily."

"What are you talking about?" Behind Juliet the thing that the boy had thrown out was beginning to change in shape.

The thing at the moment looked like a black blob that was bubbling and frothing. It began to twist itself upwards until it resembled a twisted blob that glowed with a faint electronic light.

The boy pointed at the thing that was only continuing to grow in size. "Meet the Virus." He snapped his fingers which caused the Virus to start levitating off the ground before it slid past them and beneath the door of the room.

Juliet tried to walk around the boy, but he also took a step to the side blocking her. "Would you mind moving so I can go after that thing?"

The boy only continued to smile. "You're not getting away from me." He aimed a punch at Juliet who just barely managed to duck out of the way.

"What's wrong with you?" Juliet had to jump away again when the boy went to punch her again.

Instead of responding the boy continued to aim punches at Juliet; his knuckles barely brazing her cheek. The boy saw the heard the Virus finish squeaking beneath the doorway before he jumped backwards. Behind him from out of nowhere materialized a dark portal that came out in a hushed whisper. The boy hopped backwards and disappeared into the portal.

Juliet blinked a couple times in confusion. "Where did he come from?" She shrugged and began to walk out of the room when she got the feeling that someone was watching her. "Is someone there?" Juliet looked around the room for a few more seconds and saw no one, but when she turned around to leave the room she was face to face with Erik. "What are you doing here?" She didn't seem to notice that like the boy Erik wasn't wearing the red or blue uniforms from Space Paranoids.

"I was just checking up on you." Erik looked around the room with a board look on his face. "I think the better question is what are **you **doing here? Have you found any of the seven pure lights yet?" He saw her nod her head, but didn't look very impressed. "So, what have you found out?"

"There's a little girl in Radiant Garden named Kairi who is one of them." She saw that Erik still didn't look very impressed. "Erik, can I ask you a question?"

"You already have I suppose another would be all right."

"Why do you need me to find the seven pure lights? Are you going to do something with them?"

Erik had to come up with something quickly to quell Juliet's curiosity. "As I'm sure you've noticed there is darkness that is starting to creep into the worlds. If I can gather the seven pure lights then the darkness can be sent back to where it came and the worlds will be safe. For instance that boy that was just here is from out of the darkness. The only thing I know about him is that his name is Puck and he is probably going to be quiet the problem." Erik looked away from Juliet not feeling entirely comfortable with the admiring gaze he was receiving.

Juliet hadn't really felt ready to go on this quest in the first place, but after hearing what Erik had told her she was feeling more than ready to do anything he told her. "Don't worry I can take on anything that comes my way. I'll find the rest of the pure lights and tell you as soon as I can."

Gingerly Erik patted Juliet on the head. "That's very reassuring. Now if you don't mind I have matters to tend to elsewhere and I leave this in your very capable hands." With that Erik turned around and walked out the door only to be quickly followed by Juliet.

By the time Juliet got out of the room she couldn't find Erik anymore, but saw Akio standing near a lift on the far side of the hall. "Akio, did you see someone come out of the room I was just in?"

Akio looked around the hall and shook his head. "There's no one else out here." He saw Juliet look a little disappointed before she started to walk over to him. "I did see this weird sludge looking thing go past earlier, but no one besides you have come out of that room."

Juliet found herself wondering how both Erik and Puck had managed to get past Akio without being noticed, but maybe Akio just hadn't noticed them leaving. "That thing you saw go past is called the Virus and we need to go after it. This boy named Puck let loose in this world and he's one of the bad guys."

Akio pointed in the direction the lift was going. "It went up that way. I've been to this world one other time and the only things that are in that direction are the I/0 Tower and the dock for the solar sailors."

"Where does the solar sailor go?" Juliet saw Akio swallow hard. "What's the matter?"

"That goes to where the MCP is."

"What's the MCP?"

Again Akio swallowed hard looking like he didn't want to talk about it at all. "The MCP stands for Master Control Program and essentially it runs this world. That's also where Commander Sark is and he's just as bad as the MCP."

Juliet shrugged; the thought of getting into a conflict with either the MCP or Commander Sark didn't seem to bother her. "For your sake we'll steer clear of them, but we need to find the Virus." Not waiting for Akio she got onto the lift. "Well, are you coming with?"

Akio hastily jumped onto the lift after Juliet just as the lift started off. He sat down on the edge of the lift and let his legs dangle off the edge. "What took you so long in that room?"

"I just ran into the person who sent me on this mission in the first place." Juliet waited until the lift was secured into place before she hopped off quickly followed by Akio. "Now….I say we check the I/0 Tower first. Which direction is it?"

Pointing over at the right pathway Akio walked up to Juliet's side. "The I/0 Tower is over that way." He was glad that Juliet had decided to go to the tower instead of going on the solar sailor which meant that they wouldn't be having to go anywhere near the MCP or Sark. "What does this Virus thing look like anyway?"

From out of nowhere a green tentacle swung out at Akio hitting him in the stomach and sending him flying across the hall. The Virus came creeping out of the hallway leading to the I/0 Tower swinging long green tentacles as it went.

Juliet got in front of Akio with her Keyblade at the ready. "Why don't you go hide somewhere I got this."

"No, I want to help." Akio got up and readied his disk.

"Fine, just don't let yourself get grabbed by that thing." Juliet sprung up and struck the Virus in its flabby gelatinous body. All though her attacks simply bounced off the Virus she tried hitting it again, but to no avail. "Its no use our attacks aren't doing anything."

Akio flung his disk again, but like Juliet's Keyblade it simply bounced off. "Do you know of any other way to attack this thing?"

Juliet had to jump out of the way when the Virus shot a laser at her from out of a single bulbous eye near the top of its body. _Why spell did Erik give me in Andy's Room? Blizzard? No was thunder?_

"Try fire." She heard somebody whisper in her ear.

After having to dodge another attack from the Virus, Juliet took a step back and aimed her Keyblade at its eye before a small ball of fire shot out of the tip of the Keyblade hitting the virus square in the eye. She heard it let out of a wet sounding squeal as it retreated backwards flailing its tentacles as it went. Juliet shot another slightly larger fireball at the Virus once again hitting it in the eye. "I think I've gotten it weaker now we can destroy it."

Akio thrust the disk out again hitting the Virus in its eye causing it to emit another damp squeal.

The Virus began to slide away from Juliet and Akio melting a little as it did so.

"I think one more attack will do the trick." Juliet gave the Keyblade a good toss and this time when it hit the Virus in the eye it knocked the eye out of its socket.

The Virus gave a violent shudder before collapsing in a pile of mush which then began to melt away.

Juliet gave a sigh of relief as she watched the remains of the Virus disappear. "Well, that wasn't as hard as it could have been."

"Don't be getting too cocky now." Erik had been watching the fight with the Virus and was feeling a bit more pleased with Juliet. "There's still plenty of Wraiths left in the other worlds. Not to mention people like Puck lurking about in the dark too."

Akio had never seen Erik before, but just from this first meeting he got the feeling that he couldn't be trusted. "How do you know about these monsters?"

Erik ignored the cool glare he was getting from Akio. "I've been to many different worlds that's how I know about the monsters." Still ignoring the Akio, Erik walked over to Juliet and lightly tapped her on the wrist. "I thought you could use some more magic. I just gave you the blizzard spell that might come in handy in the near future."

Juliet felt her cheeks tinge a light pink from the feeling of Erik's fingers on her. "Thanks….where do you think we should head next?"

Erik's eye twitched ever so slightly at the word 'we' assuming that the 'we' meant her and Akio. "If you knew where any of the other seven pure lights were I'd suggest there, but you don't know where any of them are so just go to the next closest world." He turned around and began to walk away.

Akio saw that Juliet was staring after Erik with a look of admiration on her face and waved a hand in front of her. "You think we should head out of here now?"

"Oh, yah sure."

Quietly they made their way back to the lift and down the hallway until they were back in the room that they'd started in. Juliet stood aside to allow Akio to type something in on the yellow computer that was in the room and found herself wondering how Erik managed to get around the worlds so quickly and quietly. "Were you serious about coming with me, Akio?"

Akio looked away from the computer and turned to Juliet. "Of course I was serious. I've wanted to see the outside worlds for a long time and this is going to give me that opportunity." He pressed a few more buttons on the keyboard.

Once the pair had gotten out of the Space Paranoids world and back into Radiant Garden they found that the lab of Ansem of the Wise was deserted and quickly made their way through the dark twisting halls and out of the castle.


	6. Chapter 6

[A/N: As always Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix. Thank you for the reviews and favorites.]

The ride from Radiant Garden to the new world lasted longer than Juliet had planned, but when they landed it looked like what they had landed on was a vessel moving through space. They had to walk along an outside race track for a few minutes before entering an empty room with a platform in the middle. Juliet looked around the room finding that it looked similar, but less blue then the rooms of Space Paranoids and the Grid.

"Do you know where we've landed?" Akio had never been outside the computer based worlds and was eager to find out where he was now.

Juliet pulled the map from her pocket and unfolded it. She began tracing the route they'd taken from Radiant Garden and came to a dot labeled Deep Space. "It looks like we landed in Deep Space….whatever that means."

Akio looked around the empty room before walking over to a window. "Sure does look like we're deep in space. Is that really what the world is called?" As he continued to stare out the window he saw something large drift past the window. "What was that?"

Walking over to the window Juliet looked out, but saw nothing. "What's what?"

"Nothing….don't let it bother you."

As they entered a pale blue hallway the pair could hear something coming down the opposite side of the hall and ducked back into the doorway. Juliet peeked out just in time to see a strange looking little blue critter with four arms, two legs, and a pair of antenna wearing a red jumpsuit scurrying down the hallway. _Wonder what that is._ She took a step out of the doorway, but ended tripping a large purple and grey chubby and four eyed creature who wore what looked like a prison jump suit. "Oh, sorry about that."

"Oh you clumsy…." The creature got up from the floor and looked back at Juliet his previously angry expression changing to one of pleasure. "Oh, you weren't who I thought you were. My apologizes young lady." He did an awkward sort of bow which made Juliet snicker into her hand.

"That's all right Mr…."

"Dr. Jumba Jookiba at your service." He put emphasis on the doctor title.

"What was that thing that just ran past?" Juliet could still hear the critter making strange squeaking noises as it continued to run down the hall.

Jumba looked a little embarrassed at the thought of whatever the creature was. "Ah well that is…well you see that's an experiment of mine."

"What do you mean by experiment?" Akio by now had ventured out of the doorway and was standing beside Juliet. "Did you creature that weird little blue thing?"

Jumba's embarrassment faded to pride at this. "Yes, I created him. That was experiment 626 and if you don't mind I need to go catch him before somebody else does." With that he began to waddle down the hall.

Juliet began to walk after Jumba finding it easy to keep up with his short, but hurried strides. "We could help you if you need help." She saw Jumba stop and look back at her with a hopeful look on his face.

"Oh, would you? That would be most helpful." The scientist sat down on the floor heaving; his face covered in a thin film of sweat. "Just to warn you watch out for Captain Gantu."

Akio stopped while Juliet continued to walk out of the passage way. "Who's Captain Gantu? Why should we watch out for him?"

"Captain Gantu has it out for me. If he finds out that two are helping me he'll do anything in his power to get you in trouble." Jumba dabbed at his brow with a handkerchief. "Just find experiment 626 and you'll be fine."

Akio had to run to watch up with Juliet who by now had reached the next hallway. "Juliet, you might want to slow down. He was trying to warn us about-"

"About Captain Gantu I heard all about that." Juliet could hear the scampering coming from further ahead of them and began to walk quicker. "Come on I think I can hear experiment 626 up ahead." She readied her Keyblade just in case when a large shaggy black dog sprung up at them. "Don't tell me wraiths are in this world too." Juliet swung her Keyblade down and struck the anger dog on the snout sending it whimpering down the hall.

The anger dog began running down the hall towards where experiment 626 was and entered a large room, but was elevated on a platform. The dog went to jump off the ledge when a laser came out of nowhere and shot it down.

Juliet got down on her knees and peeked over the lip of the ledge to see a large shark looking creature holding what looked like a gun. "Do you think that's Captain Gantu?"

Akio also got down laid beside Juliet. "I don't know. Looks like it could be, but that Dr. Jumba didn't tell us what he looked like."

Squirming forward Juliet waved down at Gantu much to Akio's shock. "Maybe if we can get his attention we can find out if he knows where experiment 626 went." She felt Akio pull her arm down and attempted to free herself from his grip. "What are you doing?"

"I could ask you the same question. Dr. Jumba told us to steer clear of Gantu." He sighed heavily as he saw Gantu begin to walk closer to the ledge. "See what you did? If we get caught it will be your fault."

Juliet scowled at Akio. "No one said you had to come with me. Remember it was you who wanted to come with me. You could have just stayed in the Grid."

This got Akio quiet, but he still looked irritated with her. "Fine, you want to go ahead and maybe get us killed then fine you do that."

She continued to scowl at him, but propped herself up on her elbows to get a better look at Gantu. "Excuse me, are you Captain Gantu?" Instead of getting a verbal answer the both of them were shot at. "I think that's a yes. Just to be safe." She went forward again and waved back down at Gantu. "Can I assume that that shot means 'yes' that you are Captain Gantu?"

"I am Captain Gantu and you are intruders. Come down so that I can take you to the Grand Council Woman."

Juliet looked over at Akio and shrugged. "It couldn't hurt to go see this Grand Council Woman would it?"

"I wouldn't." Akio pointed down at Gantu. "I get the feeling he's one of those guys who will get rid of us as soon as we go down there."

"Fine, fine we won't go down there, but how do we tell him that we don't want to go down there?" She saw Akio raise an eyebrow. "Where's that weapon you were using earlier?"

"That's right I almost forgot about it." Juliet summoned her Keyblade and aimed it at Gantu. "I don't think I want to risk going down there and fighting him up close. He looks a little too big for me to handle. I guess I'll use magic and stay up here." She pointed the Keyblade out so that it was hanging over the edge of the of the ledge and shot out a fire spell.

Gantu, not expecting the magic based attack had to jump out of the way. "What do you think you're doing? Come down from there!"

Instead of complying with Gantu and coming down Juliet shot another fire spell down at Gantu who once again jumped out of the way. "Why doesn't he stand still?" She glared over at Akio who looked like he was going to say something. "I know the answer already you don't need to tell me."

After dodging the spell Gantu shot another laser up at Juliet and Akio just barely missing them. "I'm going to give you one more chance to come down."

Once again Juliet shot another spell at Gantu this time she just barely missed his hand. "I think I can hit him next time."

Gantu shot at the pair again once again just barely missing the top of Juliet's head.

This time Juliet crawled a bit more forward so that her upper body was hanging off the ledge. "Akio, if I start to fall grab me." She felt Akio grab onto her waist as she aimed the Keyblade at the hand that was holding the blaster. "I think I can hit him from this far away." She shot a blizzard spell this time.

Gantu let out a yell and dropped his blaster.

Juliet felt Akio pull her back onto the ledge just as experiment 626 jumped onto the ledge and ran past them back into the halls. Quickly, the two of them got up and darted back into the halls leaving Gantu on the lower level to nurse his wounded hand.

They ran back into the halls in hot pursuit of experiment 626 running past Dr. Jumba who was still sitting in the hall and ended up entering another room that was made up of several high platforms.

Experiment 626 found himself backed up against a wall and he snarled at Juliet and Akio.

Juliet took a step forward which only prompted further snarling from experiment 626. "Its ok…we're not going to hurt you." When Juliet took another step forward something came crashing down from the ceiling.

The creature that came down from the ceiling had a body gelatinous like the Virus, but was bigger and had a light layer of armor on its body. It slid across the floor towards Juliet, Akio, and experiment 626 rising its vaguely humanoid looking arms.

The comet slime wraith was a rather hideous looking creature that looked human in shape, but was completely covered in a thick yellowish slime. It lunged forward towards experiment 626 with one of its damp looking arms, but it was buffed back by Juliet's Keyblade. It turned its blank face towards Juliet and let out a deep yowling sound and lashed out one of its arms hitting her in the chest.

Akio jumped forward and threw his disk at comet slime hitting it where its jaw would be. "Stay away from her you….thing."

Comet slime took a slimy step towards Akio and swung one of its arms out again. Instead of attacking Akio it went after Juliet again and knocked her off her feet.

For some reason Akio felt himself getting angry with the wraith and threw his disk at it hitting it in the face this time.

This time the wraith turned its attention to Akio and lashed out with one of its arms. It almost knocked Akio off his feet, but it was hit in the torso.

Juliet struggled to her feet after getting the wind knocked out of her. "Don't worry about this Akio I can handle it." She took a swing at comet slime, but missed and was knocked in the stomach by its other arm. Juliet fell backwards again landing hard on her back.

Akio got in front of her brandishing his disk at the wraith and was about to throw it when a laser from a blaster came out from behind him.

Experiment 626 came running up behind Akio and Juliet brandishing a blaster at comet slime and hit comet slime several times in various body parts.

Following experiment 626's lead Akio threw his disk again this time hitting comet slime in the neck and decapitating it.

Comet slime shuddered violently before collapsing in a pile of mush.

Juliet got up holding her stomach and walked over to Akio as she looked down at comet slime. "Good job Akio didn't think you had it in you." She turned to experiment 626 who was still holding the blaster. "Maybe we shouldn't tell Dr. Jumba where we found him. Why don't you run along?"

Experiment 626 looked up curiously at Juliet before tossing the blaster aside and scurrying up the walls of the room; disappearing through a doorway at the top of the room.

Juliet and Akio made their way back through the hallways of Deep Space and very quietly went past Dr. Jumba who was still sitting in the hall.

As they made their way towards the exit Juliet turned to Akio with a little smile. "Thanks for saving my skin back there. I think if you hadn't been there I probably wouldn't have been able to get out."

Akio's cheeks tinged a light pink. "Oh, it was nothing. I just didn't think it would be right to leave you in that situation so I did what I thought needed to be done."

Juliet clapped Akio on the back and summoned her glider. "Well I think our work here is done."


	7. Chapter 7

[A/N: This will probably be the last new chapter for a couple of days, but the next chapter is in the works. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix. Reviews are all appreciated.]

As Juliet and Akio entered the new world they found that it was dark and full of twisting tunnels. Juliet pulled out the map and unfolded it. "According to the map we're in Olympus Coliseum." She looked around the dark world from the puddle of green liquid in the middle of the room to the two large doors on either side of the room. "Doesn't look like a coliseum."

Akio was also looking around the room when he saw a small doorway that led up to what looked like a bright upper part of the world. "Maybe the coliseum is up there." He began to walk over to the bright doorway when he heard something behind him. "Did you hear that?"

"Yeah I heard it." Juliet summoned her Keyblade and began to walk towards the noise. "Could be a wraith hiding somewhere."

Coming out from behind the rocks came two demons. One was red and pudgy while the other was green and skinny. They saw Juliet and Akio and quickly darted past them and through one of the doorways.

Juliet began to walk after the pair of demons when she heard a voice call out to her.

Standing in the bright doorway was a tall boy with red hair wearing a white toga. "What are you doing in the underworld? It's not safe down there."

All though she would have liked to follow the demons deeper into the underworld Juliet thought better of it and instead began to walk over to the red haired boy. "What did you call this world? I thought it this was the Olympus Coliseum."

The boy blinked in confusion and pointed back the way he'd come. "Up there is the Olympus Coliseum. Where you're standing is the underworld. Why don't you come up here with me? It's much nicer up here." He suddenly looked excited. "The games are going on right now why don't you enter?"

Juliet looked back at Akio and shrugged. "I don't know what he's talking about games….but it could be fun." She began to walk over to the boy. "Sure we'll join in your games."

The boy looked even more excited and he grabbed Juliet's whole arm pumping it furiously. "My name's Hercules. This is so great. It will be so much fun to have somebody new participate in the games. We've got some strange competitors this time around."

Akio walked after Juliet and also found himself getting his whole arm shook by Hercules. "What kind of competitors are they?"

"They look like animals."

Juliet and Akio looked between each other knowing that the wraiths were probably behind it. "Yeah, we should check it out." As they walked into the upper part of the world both of them were struck at how blindingly bright it was and had to shield their eyes.

Hercules on the other hand seemed completely used to the light and was bounding ahead of them through a walk way that was lined with pots. Up ahead of them was another large wooden doorway guarded by two large stone gladiators who had their swords crossed above the doorway. As they neared the doorway they could see a chalk board and in front of the chalk board was a short pudgy little man who was half goat.

The pudgy goat man turned around to face the trio. "Oh Herc, glad you're back. Do you have everything set up for the games?"

Hercules sighed as he walked up to the goat man. "Phil, this is Juliet and she wants to enter the games."

Phil turned around and looked Juliet up and down. "A girl participating in the games? Don't make me laugh."

Juliet scowled at Phil. "Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I couldn't participate in your games. Just give me the chance to prove you wrong."

"Fine, fine _girl_ I'll give you a chance, but one chance only." With that Phil hopped down from the stool he'd been on and pushed the doors open to reveal a small stone chamber within. "The games are ten rounds. If you can win all ten rounds then you win the games."

"Sounds easy enough." Juliet followed Phil followed by Akio and Hercules though another doorway leading to an area. She walked to the center of the area; Keyblade ready. "So, where's the first competitor?" As soon as she said this a monkey came out of nowhere and began scratching at her face. _Wraiths, I should have known._

The games didn't last very long since Juliet knew how to fight her way through a pack of wraiths. She sighed heavily and allowed the Keyblade to disappear. "So, did I win the games?"

Phil's mouth was hanging up, but he quickly closed it before Juliet had time to notice. "Well, that was impressive for a girl, but you want to be a hero then there's one more thing you need to do."

"What's that?"

Phil walked over to the room that they'd come from and pointed at the entrance the underworld. "A couple of demons by the names of Pain and Panic have been causing trouble down in the underworld. If you can stop them then maybe I'll give the title of hero."

Juliet looked back at Akio who looked like he would be more interested in staying in the bright Olympus Coliseum then going down to the gloomy underworld. "Sure we can do that. What do these demons look like?"

"One of them short, fat, and red. The other is tall, skinny, and green. They go by the names of Pain and Panic. They're minions of Hades so don't take them lightly."

Akio perked up upon hearing the names 'Hades'. "Hades? You mean the lord of the underworld?"

"Yeah that Hades. Why you heard of him?" Phil asked looking a little suspicious.

"The one programmed me mentioned a Hades once." Akio saw the confused looks he was getting from Juliet, Phil, and Hercules and smiled back at them. "Its nothing don't let it bother you." He saw that Juliet was starting to walk back to the lobby that they'd come out and quickly followed after her. "Why are you going so fast, Juliet?"

Juliet pushed the doors of the lobby open and walked down the few steps back onto the path leading back to the underworld. "Because we need to find the seven pure lights and there might be one of them in this world." She looked enthusiastic about the idea of fulfilling the task that Erik had set out for her.

Entering the underworld again Juliet felt a chill go up her spine. "I feel bad….do you?"

Akio nodded. "It almost feels like this place is sapping our strength."

Juliet summoned her Keyblade when she heard the familiar scratching sound of oncoming wraiths. "You think this Hades might be using wraiths too?"

"He might be."

Taking a few steps forward Juliet was nearly knocked over by a pride elephant wraith that came stampeding out of the underworld only to be struck down by the Keyblade. She had to lower the Keyblade imminently after attacking the wraith; her arms feeling heavy. "I feel exhausted already and there was only the one wraith."

"I think it would be a good idea for us to avoid fighting wraiths in this world if it's taking away our strength."

As they continued their descent into the underworld Juliet and Akio had to duck and dodge several more wraiths. All the while they could feel themselves getting weaker. They entered a lower level of the underworld full of twisting halls when they heard the sound footsteps.

Coming out from the lower levels was a tall woman with wild black hair that hung all over the place wearing red. She looked at Juliet and Akio smiling at them ever so slightly before she disappeared around a corner.

Juliet scurried after the woman, but by the time she got to where the woman had gone around the corner she had vanished. "That's strange. Wonder where she came from." She walked back to Akio who was now looking around the corner that the woman had come from.

Akio pointed at Pain and Panic who were arguing amongst themselves. "I think we can get the jump on them if we go now," he whispered. He readied his disk.

Juliet also readied her Keyblade and took a step forward. "They don't look like they'll cause much of a problem. Probably can take them out easily." She jumped out from behind the corner Keyblade out. "Stop right where you are."

Pain, the shorter fat red demon looked back at Juliet. "Who do you think you're talking too little girl? We're not doing anything wrong."

Panic, the taller green skinny one also piped up. "We're not doing anything wrong yet." He yelped in pain as Pain stomped on his foot.

Both Juliet and Akio exchange and look of confusion before turning their attention back to Pain and Panic. "Do you two work for a guy named Hades?" Juliet asked.

Both demons grew evil smiles; their shadows seemed to morph and change behind them. Panic was the first one to speak up this time. "You'll never find Hades."

Juliet and Akio had to back away as the two demons began to change appearances into two large snakes.

Pain and Panic both lashed out at the same time prompting Juliet and Akio to jump out of the way. Panic went to bite Juliet, but was smacked upside the head by Akio's disk. The snake demon hissed in response and backed off for a second only to attack Akio instead.

Akio stumbled backwards and tripped over Pain who had gotten under his feet and fell to the ground. He managed to grab his disk in time to block a bite from Panic and knocked the demon hard in the jaw.

Pain and Panic were both looming over Akio and were poised to attack again when the Keyblade struck in the neck and wound them around the neck of the weapon.

Juliet began to wind up her arm before stopping the Keyblade in mid air sending Pain and Panic flying off into the distance. She bent down breathing hard and let the Keyblade disappear. "This place is really starting to get to me. We should probably get out of here pretty quickly."

Unknowingly to Juliet and Akio they'd had an onlooker during the fight with Pain and Panic. Hades was fuming. Behind the lord of the dead was a giant black dog with three heads; three drooling mouths full of sharp cruel fangs. "Cerberus go!"

As they began to walk back out the way they came Juliet heard the sound of something growling behind them. She turned around in time to see Cerberus guardian of the underworld and pet of Hades looming over them; his growls making the stone walls vibrate.

With a roar Cerberus lunged at the pair with a mighty sweep of one of his giant paws. He missed, but just barely as Juliet and Akio jumped out of the way. The giant dog lunged forward with all three of his mouths open with the intent of eating both them.

Juliet had to jump backwards again when the Cerberus came forward, but a well aimed fire spell to one of the giant dog's noses sent the monster reeling back in pain.

Akio came up behind Juliet and threw his disk over the top of her head hitting Cerberus's second head in the eye. He caught the disk as it came back to him and threw it again this hitting the giant dog's third head in the snout.

Cerberus roared in outrage and began to run towards them.

"I think this would be a good time for us to get out of here," Juliet said. They both turned quickly and began to run towards the exit of the underworld.

The monstrous three headed dog only quickened his pace and jumped over them landing right in front of the exit. He leaned down and roared at them.

Juliet stopped in her tracks nearly sliding into one of Cerberus's noses. She quickly turned back to Akio. "I think we can get out of here if you keep him distracted."

Akio also had to slide to a stop almost bumping into Juliet. "What do you want me to do?"

"Use your disk to distract Cerberus, but keep him here I think if I can get up onto his back I can get the door open. "

Cerberus was snarling down at them before he was smacked in the nose with Akio's disk. He thrust a paw out at Akio who had to leap out of the way and threw the disk back at the middle head.

With a bit of difficult Juliet jumped up onto Cerberus's back and ran towards the door. She began to push against the door with her shoulders. She could hear the door beginning to creak open and continued to push until there was a crack just big enough for them to squeeze through. "Come on Akio I got the door open." Before she met Akio, Juliet would have slipped through the door and left behind who ever came with her, but now it just didn't seem right.

Akio caught his disk as it flew back to him and jumped up on one of Cerberus's snouts and ran up the back of his neck and onto his back. By the time Akio got onto Cerberus's back the giant dog had begun to run in the opposite direction which forced Akio to jump down. When he landed he felt a pain go up his right leg. He attempted to get up, but fell back down from the pain. Akio could hear Cerberus running back towards and scrambled up again to try and hobble out of the room when he felt Juliet grab his arm and pull him out.

Juliet pushed Akio behind her and put her shoulder up against the door to push it shut just as Cerberus reached it. She turned to Akio with a smile. "I think that was probably one of the most terrifying things I've ever done. What about you?" She saw him smile weakly back at her through a wince. "We should probably see if you can get that looked at."

Akio felt Juliet put one of his arms around her neck to help him walk; his cheeks reddening ever so slightly. "Thanks, but I don't think I need any help."

"Really? Fine." Upon saying this Juliet moved out from under Akio not noticing when he nearly collapsed.

Sucking up his pride and wanting to make sure that Juliet wouldn't notice his pain Akio walked after her back towards the entrance of the coliseum.

Hercules was busy training when they got back, but Phil was available. Luckily for Akio, Phil had some first aid training and was able to bind his injured leg. "Try to stay off of it," had been the satyr's words of advice.

Juliet sat down next to Akio who was still in a bit of pain. "We got rid of those two demons you were talking about, Pain and Panic."

Phil chuckled under his breath. "You got rid of them for the moment they'll be back."

"You said after we got rid of them that we'd be heroes," piped up Akio.

Again Phil only laughed. "I'd say you two are only worth being called junior heroes."

Akio scowled at Phil. After all they'd done to get rid of those two demons then again it wasn't like Phil knew about the fight with Cerberus. "I guess we can be junior heroes." This time he allowed Juliet to help him up, but still had a bit of a limp.

"Phil, thanks your help with patching Akio up, but I think its time we were on our way."

"Don't mention it kid."

They turned and began to walk towards the exit of the lobby when Juliet stopped. "Tell Hercules we said bye."

"Will do."

As they left the lobby and reentered the sandy pathway leading to the underworld Akio tried to shrug Juliet's arm off of him. "Thanks for the help, but I really can walk on my own."

Juliet hesitantly removed her arm. "If you think you can walk on your own." She looked up at the bright blue sky and sighed. "I think its time we move on."


	8. Chapter 8

[A/N: Sorry about the longer than usual wait for this chapter, but I needed a little bit of a break to brainstorm for this chapter. I know this chapter is a little shorter than the others, but it was fun to write. As always Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix. All reviews are appreciated.]

The next world was bright, colorful, and looked like something out of a child's storybook. Juliet pulled the familiar map out of her pocket and unfolded it. "According the map we're in….Disney Town." She looked around the world for a few seconds; a bright smile forming on her face. "This place looks like fun."

Akio on the other hand was feeling a little ill as he looked around the brightly colored town; that and the pain in his leg was starting to get to him again. He was trying to keep up with Juliet who was now walking through the town square, but winced every time he put weight on his injured leg. "Do you think you could slow down a little, Juliet?"

Juliet slowed her pace and walked back to get Akio. "Are you sure you're alright?"

"Fine, never better." Akio tried to mask his pain as he continued to follow Juliet.

As they entered the town square Juliet's whole face lit up.

In the center of the square was a large gazebo that was decorated with balloons and brightly colored streamers. Against one of the walls was a stage and in front of the stage was a strange looking machine with a seat and a small cannon pointing off the front.

Juliet darted over the strange looking machine and stared up at it. "I wonder what kind of contraption this is."

Akio limped over to her side and looked up at the machine. "Doesn't look like a weapon." He hobbled over to the other side of the machine to get a better look at it. As he continued to look at the machine he felt someone tugging on his shirt and looked down to see three little white ducks that were identical with the expectation of their hats and shirts.

One wore red, another green, and the third blue. The one in red was the one who'd been pulling on Akio's shirt. "Are you guys new? We've never seen you around here before."

The one in green looked between them and the machine. "Do you want to play the ice cream beat with us?"

Juliet knelt down so that she was eye level with the triplets. "I'd love to play if you showed me how."

The one in blue hopped up and down excitedly before jumping up on the machine and sitting in the seat. "Huey, Louie get up on the stage so we can show her how to play."

"Shouldn't we start the music first, Dewey?" Louie asked.

Dewey nodded. "I almost forgot about that." He waited until the triplet in green had started the music before he took aim with the cannon on the front of the machine.

The machine made a wet sound before it shot out a ball of ice cream which landed on Huey's cone as he and Louie danced to the music.

The triplet in blue looked down at Juliet. "All you have to do is shoot ice cream at the three of us to the beat of the music and land it in our cones. Do you want to try?"

Juliet didn't bother to see if Akio was interested in looking around the rest of the town and nodded. "Sure, I'll play." She waited until Dewey had hopped down from the machine's seat before she crawled up. "Akio, why don't you go look around the rest of the town and have some fun."

Akio looked around the square before he turned his attention back to Juliet, but found that she was all ready engulfed in the ice cream beat game. "I guess I'll go look around the rest of this town then." He left Juliet after saying this and went down another street where he came out onto a little step up where there were some steps going down to a race track. "This looks interesting." He hobbled down the steps towards the track where he saw two chipmunks wearing aprons; the only difference between the two was that one of them had a red nose and the other had a black nose; the one with the red nose had two buck teeth as well. "What's going on over here?" He said this in time to see a couple of carts go racing past on the track.

The chipmunk with the black nose began to hop and up down to try and get Akio's attention. "Do you want to participate in the rumble race too?"

Akio looked over the chipmunks at the race track to see the carts come around the corner again. "Sure, looks like it could be fun."

A few minutes later Akio was standing on a red glider all though with a little bit of difficulty from the pain in his leg. As he looked around at the rest of the racers he didn't recognize them at all and was more interested in looking at what he could see of the race track. As the buzzer went off the glider took off quicker than he expected and nearly fell off the glider.

It was exhilarating to fly through the air at such fast speeds. Akio quickly found himself leading the pack as he went around for a second lap when he heard someone calling out his name. He looked around in time to see Juliet in the crowd cheering for him. For some reason he felt the need to go faster as if he wanted to impress her and began to pull away from the rest of the racers.

Juliet had gotten a dish of ice cream as a reward from the triplets and had gone looking for Akio to see if he wanted some of it. She continued to cheer for him as he came around for a third loop.

The race ended after two more laps with Akio coming in first. He hopped off the glider and felt his legs wobbling beneath him. "That was amazing. I don't think I've ever felt that kind of exhilaration before." He saw Juliet waving over at him with a dish of ice cream in her other hand. "Where you watching the whole race?"

"Most of it." She showed him the ice cream dish. "The triplets gave me some ice cream for playing with them. Do you want to try some?" She spooned up some ice cream and offered it to him.

Akio hesitantly took the ice cream spoon and ate it. "That's good. What flavor is it?" The ice cream was a light caramel color and was topped with honey.

"I think they said it was called honey bunny." Juliet took another bite of ice cream relishing its sweetness. "What do you want to go do next?"

"We could go see what's over there." He pointed over at the next path that led to another part of the town.

The next area of Disney Town was large like the town square, but in the middle instead of a gazebo there was a giant net and standing next to the net was a horse wearing overalls and a plow collar. "Would you kids be interested in a round of fruit bowl?"

Akio was now feeling pumped after his win at rumble racing and this time he was the one wanting to play a game. "Why don't we play? We haven't done anything together besides fight since we met."

Juliet tossed the empty ice cream dish into the trash can and nodded. "Sure why not. You do have a point the only thing we've done together is fight wraiths."

The game of fruit bowl consisted of having Juliet standing on one side of the net and Akio on the other side. Giant pieces of fruit were used instead of a ball and was knocked between the two of them with the help of Juliet's Keyblade and Akio's disk. Juliet was able to move faster, but Akio was hitting the fruit harder.

The game ended after Juliet got hit in the eye with a grape and Akio got smacked upside the head with a strawberry. They both collapsed to the ground in laughter the pain wasn't that bad since the fruit was soft and they'd still enjoyed themselves even through the pain. They thanked the horse and headed back to the town square to see what else they could do.

Juliet saw a man hole with the cover off and tugged on Akio's sleeve. "We should go down there and see if there's something to do down there."

Akio looked a little hesitant, but still followed Juliet down through the man hole.

The underground part of the town was remarkably clean and near the ceiling there were gears that were winding and turning. Juliet led the way into the tunnels when she saw a familiar looking person.

Coming towards them was the woman in red from the underworld. Like before she only smiled at the pair before disappearing around a corner.

"I wonder who she is," Juliet mused. "We've seen her in the Olympus Coliseum and now in Disney Town. "Do you think she's trying to help us?"

Akio shrugged. "If she is she's not putting in too much of an effort."

As they walked in the direction that the woman had come from they saw a silver door in the back of the underground room.

Juliet walked up to the door and put her hands on the handle. "Maybe she came out of here."

3


	9. Chapter 9

[A/N: This chapter was surprisingly difficult to write. I was looking forward to it because Timeless River is one of my favorite worlds, but having Juliet and Akio being separated made things more difficult than I expected. Whenever I wrote a line for Mortimer I was cringing too. Thankfully I have a friend who's willing to brainstorm with me so that got me out of my rut. Anyway without further ado enjoy chapter 9. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix. All reviews are appreciated.]

The world they'd entered looked a lot different than the one they'd left. This world was completely black and white and they'd landed in the middle of a field. In the center of the field was a giant glowing ball of light. Juliet looked around the field, but found that it was empty. "This sure is a strange place. I wonder where we are." She pulled out the now well worn map and unfolded it. She looked over at Akio and jumped back in shock. "Akio, you look so different."

Akio was also black and white like the world, but his eyes were black and his clothes had also changed. He now wore long black pants, a white long sleeved shirt, a black fedora, and suspenders. "You're one to talk. Somebody changed your clothes too."

Juliet was now wearing a spaghetti strapped shimmering dress and her hair had been cut short so it went down to her ear lobes and curled inwards. Her eyes were also black. She looked around the field again when she saw someone coming down in their direction. "Maybe they could tell us where we are." Juliet walked over to a tall gangly mouse and tapped him on the shoulder. "Excuse me sir, but could you tell me what this world is called?"

The mouse looked down at Juliet at first not caring much, but he did a double take. "Ha-cha-cha what do we have here?"

Juliet ignored the mouse's comment. "What's this world called?"

He gestured to the field they were standing in. "This world? This is the Timeless River. You must not be from around here, babe."

"Yes, I'm not from around here, but anyway thanks for your help and I'll just be on my way." She turned to leave when a new thought came to her and she walked back to the mouse. "I have one more question for you."

"Anything for you babe."

Juliet blinked a couple times and tried hard to ignore the mouse's behavior. "You wouldn't happen to have seen any of the seven pure lights have you?"

The mouse was quiet in thought for a moment. "Nope, can't say I have." He casually draped a arm around Juliet's shoulder. "So babe, do you have a name?"

Akio felt his face heating up in anger and he hastily walked over to Juliet and pushed the mouse's arm off her. "My name is Akio."

The mouse pushed Akio aside. "I do believe I was talking to the lovely lady not you." He took Juliet's hand in his and kissed the top. "I am Mortimer."

This time it was Juliet who stepped away from Mortimer. "Since you don't know where any of the seven pure lights are I guess I'll just be going." When she went to walk away with Akio she felt Mortimer grab her arm.

"Why don't we go on a date and leave the stiff behind?" He gestured at Akio.

"Thanks, but no thanks. I've got some important things to do." She jerked her arm free from Mortimer's grip when she felt him grab her again. "You just can't take no for answer can you?" The next thing she knew Juliet was bound from her shoulders to her knees in rope and she fell to the ground. She felt Mortimer pick her and throw her over his shoulder.

"I didn't want to have to do that, but I won't take no for an answer." With that he began to walk off.

"What are you doing Akio don't just stand there do something."

Akio began to run after Mortimer and Juliet, but when he went around a corner they were gone. He'd come out into a smaller field that was near a pier. "Oh, this is not good this is not good at all." He doubled back to the bigger field where he saw four windows hanging in mid air. "I guess looking through some of these windows might help."

When he came out into the first window Akio found himself in the middle of a construction area. He walked to the center area of the elevated platform and plucked at the rope that was hanging down a hole in the middle of the platform. "Doesn't look like that creepy mouse took her here." When he went to walk back through the window a big black pig with jeweled eyes began running towards him. Akio threw his disk out at the gluttony pig wraith hitting it in the snout.

The pig slid backwards nearly falling off the platform before it began charging back at him with its tusks lowered.

Akio had to side step to get out of the way of the charging wraith. When the beast's back was turned he threw the disk again hitting it in the back.

The pig went sailing over the edge of the platform with a loud squeal plummeting to the ground beneath them.

Walking over to the side of the platform Akio peered over the side to see that the pig was still falling. He winced when he finally heard a thud sound as the pig hit the ground. Akio slowly crept away from the edge and went back to the window and walked back through.

Once he was back in the field Akio looked through the second window to see tiny city with a giant tower in the middle. "I wonder if he took her in here."

He spent several minutes looking around the tiny town, but still found no one. "Where could he be keeping her?" Akio sat down with his back leaning against the tower feeling dejected. "There aren't even any more wraiths in this world." He let his head rest against the stone and found himself wondering why he was so upset about Juliet getting kidnapped in the first place. "I know we're friends, but she can take care of herself." The more he thought about how Mortimer had been so brazenly flirting with her the angrier Akio found himself becoming. "Because she's my friend and I don't want that creep anywhere near her." He hopped up and began to walk back towards the window when a jeweled parrot flew up in his face.

The parrot squawked and began to scratch at Akio's face with its talons.

Akio swung his disk out and hit the parrot upside the head sending it squawking through the Lilliput.

Meanwhile somewhere else in Timeless River, Juliet was sitting on the ground on a blanket. "You know my friend is going to be here soon and if you know what's good for you you'll let me go."

"I can't do that babe. If I let you go then Master Xeha-I'll get in trouble."

Juliet cocked her head when she heard Mortimer's slip up. "Who are you talking about? You do know something about the seven pure lights. Where are the other ones?"

Mortimer gulped and licked his lips. "I'm going to be in so much trouble if I tell you anything-" He was cut off when Juliet kissed him on the cheek. "I guess I could tell you a little something."

"Go on."

Akio left the Lilliput and was back in the field and looked through a third window to see tall building on fire. "Maybe he's keeping her in here." When he slid through he was nearly thrown back through the window by a rampaging envy monkey with big glittering eyes.

The monkey screeched and tried to claw at Akio's eyes.

Again Akio had to throw his disk out hitting the monkey in the tail. He caught it as it rebounded back and threw it again this time hitting the monkey in the head. "Why is it that there are wraiths in this world, but not in Disney Town?" He had to jump out of the way when an anger dog sprung up at him; foam hanging off its fangs.

The dog sprung up at Akio and tried to bite his arm when it was smacked in the nose with his disk. It backed off for the moment and whined softly at it rubbed its sore snout with its paw.

Akio began to back away from the dog when the momentarily forgotten monkey screeched again and tried to jump on his back only to be smacked away. "That mouse can't be the one controlling all these wraiths. There has to be someone else in this world causing all the trouble."

Behind Akio was Puck was quietly creeping back into through the window. He snapped his fingers and the wraiths disappeared.

Glancing around Akio didn't see any more wraiths coming at him and decided to inspect the building. As he walked up to it he noticed that it was still on fire and thought it best that he didn't go in. "There's got to be something else behind this. That mouse probably knows, if I can find him I'll make him spill the beans."

When he walked back through the window Akio found that he only had one window left to check. "They've got to be in there." Entering the fourth and final window Akio found himself in a living room with a black ball hanging in mid air in the middle of the room. The furniture of the room was nailed down to the floor.

Out of the darkness of the one of the other rooms in the house came a lust snake began slithering out. It slithered up to Akio and was about to bite his ankle when he took a step backwards and stepped on the snake's head.

"Well, doesn't look like anyone is in here." He walked back to the window not noticing that he'd stepped on the snake's head.

Once he was back in the field Akio sighed and leaned back to look up at the grey and white sky. "Where else haven't I looked?" He took a minute to walk around the field ignoring the big ball of light that was in the middle when he came to a path that was marked 'Warf'. "That must be where they are. It's the only spot I haven't checked."

By this time Mortimer had told Juliet all she wanted to know about the seven pure lights. "So, babe is there anything else I could tell you?"

Juliet batted her eyelashes. "Do you know the names of the seven pure lights?" She grimaced as he sidled up to her.

"Actually I don't know what their names, but I already told you where they are. Maybe you think you owe me something for that?" Mortimer didn't notice that Akio was coming up behind him.

She sighed and tried to wriggle as best she could through the ropes. "Maybe if you let me loose I could." Juliet saw Akio and smiled at him.

Akio gave her a thumb up before he smacked Mortimer round the head with his disk. He watched the mouse crumple the ground and stepped over him to help Juliet to her feet. "He didn't do anything to you did he?"

"No, but I did get some information out of him."

"What kind of information," Akio asked he leaned down to begin untying Juliet.

"I know where the six other pure lights are."

Akio looked up at her as he continued to untie her. "So, where are they? You know what forget I asked for all we know he could be lying to you."

"I don't think so. He said something about a master, but I couldn't catch his name." She stepped out of the pile of rope that had collected around her feet. "Anyway let's get out of here before he wakes up."

4


	10. Chapter 10

[A/N: This chapter was a long one for me. We passed the 20,000 word mark in this chapter and introduced the last of the main characters as well. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Disney and Square Enix. All reviews are appreciated.]

Juliet and Akio had quickly left the sewers of Disney Town and left the world shortly thereafter. As they sailed through space Juliet was lost in thought about what Mortimer had told her when she looked up and noticed they were lost. She looked around to see a big blue world beneath them. _We could land there it might be one of the worlds with the seven pure lights in it. _She aimed the glider downwards towards the blue world and began to go faster.

They ended up going a little faster then what Juliet had planned and they crashed hard into the world. When Juliet opened her eyes she found that they were completely surrounded by water, but for some reason they were able to breathe. Looking around she saw schools of brightly colored fish swimming past, long tendrils of seaweed drifted about in the current, and ocean was a bright blue and sparkled in the sun light. "Where are we?" Juliet could feel something long slippery wiggling about beneath her and looked down to see that instead of legs she had a purple dolphin tail. "Akio, do you have a tail too?"

Akio was also looking at his surroundings, but was a little taken aback by the sight of a red seahorse tail. "This wouldn't happen to be one of the worlds with the seven pure lights would it?"

"I don't think so. At least it doesn't look like what I pictured they'd look like." She got the feeling they were being watch and tried to swim over to a large rock, but only succeeded in sinking. "Is there someone behind that rock? Show yourself we won't hurt you."

Peeking out from behind the rock was a mermaid with blond braided hair, bluish grey eyes, and a grey tail. She only peeked out once before ducking behind the rock again.

Juliet again tried to swim a little closer to the rock this time getting a little closer than before. "What's your name?"

She peered out from the rock and mumbled something.

"Sorry, didn't quiet catch that. Are you the one who gave us these tails?"

This seemed to perk up the mermaid a lot and she was suddenly beaming. "I'm quite good with magic. I saw you two coming towards Atlantica and I thought I'd better make sure you were prepared." She grabbed Juliet by the arm and like Hercules shook her whole arm instead of just her hand. "My name is Clementine who are you?"

Juliet had to take a minute to recover from Clementine's overly enthusiastic greeting. "I'm Juliet and this is my friend Akio."

Clementine swam around the two of them as if she was trying to get a better look. "You two aren't from around here are you? I've been all over Atlantica and I've never seen either of you before."

Juliet and Akio looked between each other for a minute wondering if they could trust Clementine. They looked her up and down from the slightly crossed eyes to the goofy smile to the way the tip of her fin was bent ever so slightly. Akio raised an eyebrow at Juliet who shrugged.

"I'm from Traverse Town and Akio is from The Grid. We're looking for the seven pure lights."

Clementine looked interested in this as she turned herself around so that she was floating upside down. "So you're from other worlds? That sounds really interesting. Can you tell me about them?"

Juliet tried to swim around Clementine only to find herself sinking again. "Maybe another time."

Clementine giggled as she watched Juliet sink further down. "Looks like you could use some lessons in swimming."

Likewise Akio was trying to follow Juliet, but was also sinking instead of swimming. "No thank you I think we can manage just fine."

The grey mermaid only continued to swim around Juliet and Akio as she continued to giggle. "What are these seven pure lights? Maybe I could help you look for them."

Juliet finally gave up and let the current bring her back up to where she was eye level with Clementine. "If you want to help us while we're here in Atlantica then you can help us." She cringed at the sound of a sharp squeal.

"Oh this is going to be so much fun." Clementine began to swim away when she stopped suddenly and swam back to them. "There's a sea witch around here that might be able to tell us where one of those seven pure lights are." She gestured at her tail. "Why don't the two of you just grab onto my tail and I can pull you along." Clementine waited until Juliet and Akio had grabbed onto her tail before she started swimming again.

Akio tightened his grip on Clementine's tail. "Who's this sea witch that you're talking about? Is she a good witch?"

Clementine quickened her stride ever so slightly causing Juliet and Akio to have to flip their own fins to keep a hold of her. "All witches have some good in them. Anyway I think Ursula I'm sure will be able to help you out with this journey you're on."

"You said her name was Ursula," Akio asked.

"Yeah you heard of her?"

"Yes, I remember hearing my user mention a sea witch named Ursula before." His face went green for a minute. "Actually, are you sure that it's safe for us to go see this Ursula?" All though Akio had never met his user he trusted him and remembered hearing that Ursula wasn't safe. "I don't think this is a good idea. Maybe we should turn back."

Instead of turning back Clementine only continued to swim faster. "I think it will be all right. Ursula told me she'll help me get to other worlds if I do something for her."

"What's that," Juliet asked.

"Something about how she couldn't be trusted, but I don't see how he'd know that unless he'd been here."

Clementine slowed down just a little bit. "I don't think you're….user did you call him? I don't think he was here. I know everyone in this world and I would know if we'd had a visitor."

"Maybe he came when you weren't around."

Juliet could sense a little tension generating between Akio and Clementine and decided to change the subject. "So Clementine you're interested in the outside worlds too?"

"It's the only thing I've dreamed about since I was a little girl." Clementine slowed down and turned around. "Ursula told me that if I can do something of her then she'll help me see the outside worlds. I just don't know what she needs me to do."

Akio would have interjected, but it was Juliet's elbow in his side that kept him quiet.

"The only thing I can think of it being is maybe something to do with King Triton." Clementine looked up at the sparkling water that was above them. "I'm willing to do anything if it means I could go somewhere else."

A few minutes later they were coming towards a tunnel of fast water. Clementine turned back to Juliet and Akio. "You two will want to hold on tight its going to get a little dicey." She waited until she felt Akio and Juliet tighten their grips on her tail before she began to swim into the fast current struggling to keep from being blown backwards.

Juliet could feel the cold hard water hitting her hard in the face and was having difficulty holding onto Clementine's tail. "How much of more of this is there?"

"Not too much further."

Shortly after this the trio was spit out into a calm darker area; down towards the sea floor was a sunken ship. Clementine gestured at the ship. "Be careful when you go near the ship there's a shark that likes to hang around down there."

In the deeper calmer water Juliet and Akio were having an easier time swimming and were able to let go of Clementine's tail. Akio was having to propel himself upwards with his short curly tail while Juliet was gliding along.

"So what's this about a shark," Juliet asked. Since being in Atlantica they hadn't seen any wraiths and could assume that they weren't aquatic. She saw something moving down near the ship and swam down a bit. "You two stay up here I'm going to go check something out."

As she swam down towards the ship Juliet could see that there was defiantly something moving down in the bottom of the ship. She saw an octopus tentacle waving at her from behind a beam and swam over to it. "Oh Erik, it's just you. For a minute there I thought it was something dangerous."

"Have you made any progress?" Erik had changed forms this time and from the waist down was an octopus.

"Actually yes I've figured out what worlds the seven pure lights are in." She saw Erik raise an eyebrow, but missed the cool glare.

"Really? Where are they then?"

"Well, when I was in Timeless River I was told that besides Radiant Garden the other six are in Wonderland, Dwarf Woodlands, Castle of Dreams, Enchanted Dominion, Agrabah, and Beast's Castle. The only problem is that I don't know where any of these worlds are." She laughed a little nervously at this.

"That's some good progress. You haven't happened to have seen Puck around have you?"

Juliet shook her head. "No, I haven't seen him in a while, but I have seen this woman in red lurking about a couple times."

Erik sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "They're multiplying. That woman is Antonia and she's just as bad as Puck. She's another one you'll want to watch out for. Well, you seem to be having an easier time then I thought you would so I'll leave you to explore the rest of this world." As he turned and began to swim out of the ship the scowl on his face grew bigger. _I can't believe that fool gave her that much information. _

As Juliet swam back out of the ship she saw a dark shadow pass over. Nervously, she glanced up to see the belly of a shark passing over the top of her. She ducked down a little further in the attempt to swim past unnoticed when her tail hit a piece of the ship.

The shark looked down right at Juliet and snarled showing rows of sharp teeth.

Juliet had to quickly swim out of the way to avoid being head butted by the shark and swam over the top of it back towards Akio and Clementine. "There's a shark coming so Clementine if you know where we could hide I suggest you tell us now."

Clementine grabbed onto Juliet and Akio and took a nose dive towards a large boulder that was blocking something off. She only let go of them just as they reached the boulder and pushed hard on it to force it to once side. "In here is where we can find Ursula." They darted in just as the shark came speeding down towards them. Once all three of them where inside the passage way Clementine pushed the rock back so that they'd be closed off from the sunken ship and the shark. She turned to Juliet. "What were you doing in the ship for so long?"

Juliet thought about saying that she'd met up with Erik again, but remembering how much Akio didn't trust him she decided to leave this out. "I thought I saw something and I just wanted to see what it was?"

"So, what was it?"

"It was nothing just a shadow on the wall."

Clementine got the feeling that Juliet wasn't telling her everything, but decided to let it go. "Come on Ursula is this way." She began to swim forward towards an oddly shaped cave that looked like a giant fish with its mouth open.

Akio was hanging behind Clementine with Juliet and didn't like the way the cave looked at all. "Are you sure this is safe? It looks really suspicious if you ask me."

"I've been to Ursula's lair before its safe. All though it is a little creepy looking I'll admit that much."

As they swam towards Ursula's lair they could hear what sounded like deep quiet moaning coming from beneath them. Juliet swam a little faster to catch up with Clementine. "Do you hear that? Wonder what it could be."

Clementine avoided eye contact with Juliet and continued to swim forward ignoring the moaning sound. "Those are…..well Ursula told me they're the ones who couldn't keep up their end of a bargain with her. Don't look at them though I think it upsets them."

As they entered the cave's mouth Akio looked down to see what looked like hundreds of small grey ghoul looking creatures looking up at them. "Clementine, what are those things?"

Clementine licked her lips a little nervously. "Those are the people who couldn't keep up their end of a deal with Ursula."

Akio continued to look down at the pathetic looking creatures that were gazing back up at them with big glassy eyes. "I still have the feeling that we shouldn't be here. This whole place is just screaming do not enter." He realized he was being left behind and had to swim faster to catch up with Juliet and Clementine. "This is the last time that I'm going to say this, but I really think we shouldn't be here."

Juliet stopped and turned around to face Akio. "Don't worry so much. Its going to be ok I'm sure Ursula can help us out if we just ask her." She heard Clementine giggle and turned around again. "What are you laughing about?"

"Oh nothing, nothing at all."

They continued to swim through the ghoul infested corridor until they came to a fork in the path. Juliet turned to Clementine. "Do you remember which way leads to Ursula?"

Clementine swam back in front of them and started to go down the left path when she was confronted by two eels; one had a glowing left eye and the other a glowing right eye. "I remember you two. You're Flotsam and Jetsam."

Flotsam, the one with the glowing left eye struck out at Clementine as he tried to bite her. "Ursula says the mermaid has had her useless used up. Ursula says get rid of the mermaid." He lashed out at Clementine again only to have his teeth blocked by Juliet's Keyblade.

Jetsam took this opportunity to attack Akio, but had his mouth jammed open by his disk.

Juliet got in front of Clementine. "I think you'd better go hide this will take a few minutes."

Clementine quickly swam into a little inlet in the cave's side wall. She peeked out to keep watching Juliet and Akio battle Flotsam and Jetsam. As she was watching them grapple with the two eels she could see octopus tentacles creeping out from further inside.

A few minutes' later Flotsam and Jetsam were sent swimming away with their tails figuratively between their legs.

By this time Akio was getting flustered with the whole situation they were in. "What did I say about all of this? What did I say?"

Juliet went back to Akio and put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "You were right, Akio. We should have listened to you." She turned to Clementine who was still in the little cave. "Where is this Ursula? I have some things I'd like to say to her."

Clementine inched her way out of the hole with a bit of difficulty. "Just follow me I can take you to her." She began to swim out in front again. "I have some things I'd like to say to her too."

As they continued to swim into further into Ursula's lair they came across more of the little ghouls and it was becoming darker. Juliet was next to Clementine with her Keyblade out just in case when she heard a deep laughter. "Is that Ursula?"

"Yeah that sounds like her."

"So you were able to defeat Flotsam and Jetsam where you?" Coming out of the darkness was a large woman with short grey hair who from the chest down was a black octopus. "I must admit you have surprised me, mermaid." Ursula looked down at Juliet and Akio. "Who are your friends?"

Akio swam out in front of Juliet and Clementine. "You have some explaining to do, Ursula. Why did you send those eels after us? We thought you were going to help us."

Ursula flicked at the bit of hair that hung down in Akio's face. "You're mistaken. The mermaid already got me what I wanted so I don't any further need of her." With that Ursula lashed out at Clementine with one of her tentacles hitting her in the stomach.

Clementine was sent reeling backwards, but was able to recover rather quickly. She sent a bolt of lightning at Ursula hitting the sea witch dead on.

Akio had to duck when he was nearly hit in the head with a tentacle and threw his disk upwards hitting her in the head.

This time Ursula turned to Juliet and began to spin furiously with her tentacles splayed out. She hit Juliet in the head with one of her tentacles and threw her backwards.

Noticing that Juliet was in trouble Clementine cast a blizzard spell hitting Ursula in the back.

The battle continued with Juliet and Clementine using magic (Clementine's being much more powerful) and Akio using his disk as a projectile weapon. Ursula was being to breathe hard and was struggling to keep up with their attacks.

Ursula was leaning up against the little table in the room her chest heaving. "Fine, fine I give up I'll tell you what you want to know."

Juliet swam up to Ursula still keeping her Keyblade out in case the sea witch decided to retaliate. "Do you know who any of the seven pure lights are?"

"No, I don't know who any of them are."

Trying to keep the look of disappointment off her face Juliet turned and began to swim out of the cave quickly followed by Akio and Clementine. "I guess I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up."

Once they were out of the deep sea with the ship Juliet and Akio had to grab onto Clementine again to get through the fast currents and were spit out back in the clear blue water.

Clementine turned and began to swim away from them. "Well, I guess this is good-bye. It was nice to meet you two."

Juliet grabbed onto Clementine's tail to stop her. "Actually, I was thinking if you wanted to come with us you'd be more then welcome." She saw Clementine turn around; her face brightened considerably. "You were really good back there when we were fighting Ursula. We could use someone with skills like yours in magic."

"Do you mean it?" She threw herself on Juliet gripping her in a tight hug.

Juliet patted Clementine on the back. "Ok Clementine I can't breathe." She sighed in relief as Clementine released her. "Since we got that established I think its time for us to go."

7


	11. Chapter 11

[A/N: I'm well aware that this is a ridiculously long chapter, but I had a lot to go on since Princess and the Frog hasn't been in any KH games so far. This chapter was actually a lot of fun since Princess and the Frog is one of my favorite Disney movies, but I had to watch it a couple times to get the dialog right. Anyway enjoy the chapter. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. All reviews are appreciated.]

When they landed in the new world it was dark, but there was a lot of activity going on. The trio looked up to see a large white mansion that was glowing against the dark sky; the activity seemed to be coming from within the mansion's gates.

Juliet unfolded the well worn map and traced the route they'd taken from Atlantica with her finger. "It says here we're in a world called Louisiana." She put the map away and began to walk towards the mansion. "Looks like there's a party going on. Why don't we go check it out?" She looked back at Akio and Clementine to see that Akio looked nervous after their last encounter while Clementine was bouncing on the balls of her feet since this was first world she'd ever been too.

Clementine grabbed onto Akio's arm and pulled him along to catch up with Juliet. "This is going to be so much fun. The only parties I've ever been to were given by this stick in the mud crab."

Entering the mansion's grounds they found that all the people were wearing costumes. Both Juliet and Clementine were looking around excitedly while Akio was nervously looking down at his feet. Juliet saw a group of people out on the dance floor and looked back at Akio. "Come on Akio dance with me."

Akio only continued to look down at his feet. "I can't dance. You go on without me."

Meanwhile Clementine had gone over to a table where a pretty black girl was. She looked down at the pastries with a confused look on her face. "What do you calls these?" She pointed at the sugar covered pastries.

The girl looked up at Clementine and smiled at her. "Those are beignets. They're going to be the house special at my restaurant." She was beaming when she mentioned restaurant.

Clementine took one of the beignets and nibbled off the corner; her face brightening almost imminently. "That's really good. You're restaurants going to be great. I'm Clementine what's your name?"

"Oh, my name's Tiana." Tiana looked away from Clementine for a moment to see a horse costume that was made up of two people.

The first person in the horse costume took the upper part off."Evening Tiana marvelous party."

"Evening Mr. Fenner." She saw the opposite end of the horse start to come up around. "And Mr. Fenner."

The second Fenner was a shorter fat man. "Fine smelling beignets you got."

Tiana took the platter of beignets and offered them to both Fenners. "Going to be the house specialty after I sign those papers you brought."

"Yes, about that," said the taller Fenner between bites.

"You were out bid."

Clementine looked over at Tiana and watched her face fall.

"What?"

The taller of the Fenners offered up an explanation while the fatter of the two began to stuff his pockets with beignets. "A fellow came in offering the full amount in cash. Unless you can top his offer by Wednesday."

"You can kiss that place goodbye," interjected the fatter of the two.

Tiana rushed after the Fenners as they began to walk away and got in front of them. "Do you know how long it took me to save that money?"

The taller of the Fenners took Tiana by the shoulders and moved her out of the way. "Exactly, which is why a little woman of your background would have had her hands full running a big business like that. You better off where you're at."

"Love those beignets though."

Tiana was becoming flustered by this point. "Wait a minute just hold on." She grabbed a hold of the tail from the fatter Fenner's costume. "Come back." She pulled hard only to have the tail come loose and fell back against the table of the beignets."

Clementine went over to Tiana to help her up. "Sorry to hear about not getting your restaurant." For the most part Clementine had lived a charmed life and wasn't used to being told that something she wanted to do wasn't going to work out. "Maybe if someone else talked to them they'd reconsider. I know I'll go talk to them for you." She hurried off.

Out on the dance floor Juliet was looking for Akio when she found him standing next to a table with a bowl of punch on it. "Come on Akio if you dance with me you'll have a good time I promise." She saw his lip twitch like he was trying to hide a smile. "You want to I know you do."

All though Akio would have felt much more comfortable staying by the punch table he ventured out towards Juliet. He felt her take him by the hand and lead him out onto the dance floor. As Akio tried to dance with her he was stepping all over her feet and quickly backed away again. "I told you I couldn't dance."

Juliet only smiled at Akio before she disappeared back onto the dance floor.

While Juliet was dancing and Akio was standing around looking uncomfortable Clementine was looking for the Fenners, but to no avail.

As the party continued on into the night Clementine grew frustrated with searching for the Fenners and instead went to go look for Juliet and Akio. She found Juliet still out on the dance floor and Akio still standing next to the punch table. "Akio, do you think you could go get Juliet? I found someone who might be one of the seven pure lights."

Akio looked interested at the possibility of the one of the seven pure lights being here and disappeared into the hoard of dancers to look for Juliet. As he searched through the group of dancers he was pulled into the grip of a heavy handed woman wearing furs. "Excuse me ma'am, but I'm looking for someone so if you could let go of me it would be much appreciated."

The woman only scowled at him before tossing him back into the crowd.

When Akio found Juliet she was engaged in a dance with a young man wearing a purple suit. "Juliet, Clementine thinks she found one of the seven pure lights."

Juliet looked over at Akio. "Well you excuse me Travis I have a matter to attend to." She left the young man standing alone in the middle of the dance floor to follow Akio. "Did she say who this person is?"

"She didn't say, but she sounded pretty sure of it." As soon as this left Akio's mouth a big dog wearing a gladiator outfit ran past chasing two frogs that were attached to a bunch of balloons.

Clementine appeared soon after chasing after the dog. "Did you two see the balloon with the frogs attached to it?" She saw them nod and looked fretful. "I think one of those frogs was one of the seven pure lights."

Juliet looked excited at the notion of finding the second of the seven pure lights. "Then we should go after them." She quickly left the party followed by Akio and Clementine. Once they were outside the mansion grounds Juliet summoned her Keyblade and had it change into her glider. "They were up in the air so this is probably the best way to go about looking for them."

As they sailed over the world Clementine saw something colorful showing up through the darkness of a swamp. Clementine pointed down at the colorful specks. "Those scraps look like the balloons the frogs were attached too."

Juliet guided the Keyblade downwards towards the remains of the balloons. Once they landed Juliet had the glider disappear back into the keychain. The bayou mud was soggy beneath their feet and made a squelching noise every time they lifted their feet. Juliet leaned down and picked up the remains of the balloons. "It looks like they were defiantly here and probably not that long ago."

Clementine took a few steps ahead of Juliet and Akio when she heard growling. "I think I may have found them." Without waiting for them she began to walk through the mud going towards the sound of the growling. When she came out into an opening Clementine saw a hoard of alligators swimming towards a tree stump with a hole in it. She shot a couple bolts of lightning magic at the alligators in the hopes of getting them away from the tree.

The alligators turned to Clementine with menacing looks on their faces and began to swim towards her.

"Ok probably not the best thing I could have done." She cast a gravity spell and lifted the alligators up out of the water. Using more concentration then she was used to Clementine tossed the group of alligators out of the swamp and off into the distance. She was breathing hard as she left the magic fade away when she heard Juliet and Akio coming up behind her. "I don't think they came this way. I don't see any sign of them."

Juliet looked around the swamp before she looked over at the tree stump. "What about in there?" She walked over to the stump and peered inside to find two frogs. "Clementine, are these the frogs you were talking about?"

Clementine and Akio came over to look inside the hole. "I think so. It's hard to tell with frogs, but I think that one is Tiana." She pointed at the frog sitting in the corner.

The frog looked up at Clementine and her whole face broke out into a smile. "Clementine, I'm so glad its you." Tiana saw the look of confusion on Clementine's face. "Oh, you're probably wondering what happened." She jerked her thumb over at the frog in the corner with a leaf over him. "Prince Charming over here made a deal with a voodoo witch doctor and got himself turned into a frog."

The other frog rolled over and upon seeing Clementine brightened considerably. He got up and walked over to the hole leaning his elbow on the edge. "Well, well who are you? You wouldn't happen to be a princess would you?"

Clementine giggled and shook her head. "No, I'm no princess I'm Clementine." She saw the frog look over at Juliet. "Juliet's not a princess either"

The frog sighed, but still put on a charming smile. "Princesses aside I think I should still introduce myself to the lovely ladies. I am Prince Naveen of Maldonia." His smile fell a bit when he saw the confused look on their faces. "At least you don't lie about being a princess like the waitress here."

Akio decided it was time for him to pipe up. "We're not from here so we don't know what this Maldonia place is." He looked over at Juliet. "So, is she one of the seven pure lights?"

Juliet looked down at Tiana hoping that the warm feeling that she'd gotten from Kairi would come back. Instead she felt nothing. "Nope, I don't think she's one of them." She looked disappointed and took a step away from the tree stump. "I don't think there's anything here. We should probably just go." As she turned to leave she felt Akio grab her shoulder.

"I saw a girl back at that party who might be one of them."

"So, why don't you go back and we'll keep looking here," said Clementine.

Akio looked over at Juliet with confusion clear on his face. "How do you tell if someone is one of the seven pure lights?"

"You feel warm all over there's no other feeling like it."

Akio looked like he was going to interject, but kept his mouth shut. "Yeah, I guess I can go back and check it out." He looked back at the direction they would have come from. "I think I can figure out how to get back from here." Akio turned and began to walk back through the bayou now that the alligators were gone it didn't seem so threatening.

The next morning Juliet and Clementine woke up to find that Tiana had built a little raft while Naveen was sitting on the back. "Where are you two headed," Juliet asked.

Tiana began to push the raft forward. "We need to find a way back to New Orleans to find a way to fix the mess that Prince Charming here got us into."

"At least I wasn't the one parading around in the phony baloney tiara." Naveen said as he made himself comfortable. He heard Tiana sigh as she pushed the raft again. "Music to paddle by."

Juliet took a step forward going further ahead than Tiana had. "Do you need some help?"

"No thank you I got this under control, but I could use a little help from someone else." She glared back at Naveen.

"Oh, I will play a little louder." As Naveen continued to play on a homemade guitar he didn't notice the pair of eyes coming out of the water behind him.

"How about a little less picken a little more-" Tiana looked back and inhaled sharply at the sight of the alligator eyes poking up from the water.

The alligator opened his mouth apparently to eat them, but instead burst out in an excited voice. "I know that tune timba mouth blues." He pulled out a trumpet and began playing a tune of his own.

Clementine giggled and looked over at Juliet who had wide eyes. "This world is funny don't you think?"

Naveen and Tiana had been embracing in fear, but upon hearing the alligator's music Naveen released Tiana and began playing his own music. "Play it brother."

The alligator and Naveen began to dance in a circle as they continued to play. "Where've you been all my life," asked the alligator.

"Where did you learn to play like that?"

"Well the bayou is the best jazz school in the world. All the greats play the river boats. Oh, Louis do anything to be up there jamming with the big boys."

"So why don't you," Naveen asked.

"Oh, I tried once." A scowl came over Louis's face. "It did not end well."

Tiana thought this would be a good time to interject. "Well it's been a pleasure you um….Louis and thank you kindly for not eating us, but we best be on our way."

Juliet and Clementine began to walk after Tiana and Naveen's little raft when Louis started talking again.

"Where you all going?"

Tiana continued to paddle as she responded. "To find somebody to break this spell."

"What spell?"

Naveen got up from his spot on the back of the raft. "Brace yourself my scaly friend. We are not frogs. We are humans."

Louis burst into a roar of laughter and collapsed to the ground. "You serious?"

"I am Naveen prince of Maldonia and she is Tiana the waitress." He then gestured up at Juliet and Clementine. "And they are Juliet and Clementine our body guards."

Juliet looked over at Clementine with a confused look on her face. "Body guards?" Her response was a shrug. "I guess we could be body guards."

Naveen leaned in closer to Louis to whisper to him as he gestured over at Tiana. "Do not kiss her."

Tiana heard this and threw her paddle down. "Now just a second this goon got himself turned into a frog by a voodoo man and-"

"Voodoo? Like the kind Mama Odie do?" Louis look terrified at the thought of his Mama Odie.

"Mama Whodi?"

"Mama Odie, she the voodoo queen of the bayou. She got magic and spells all kinds of whodo."

"Can you take us to her," asked both Tiana and Naveen.

Louis looked even more terrified. "To the deepest darkest part of the bayou facing razor sharp pricker bushes, traps, and hunters with guns? No." With that Louis leaned up against a tree and began playing his trumpet again.

By this time Juliet was starting to get a little frustrated with the situation. "Come on Clementine why don't we go look for this Mama Odie ourselves. Maybe she can help us."

Naveen on the other hand looked relaxed and he walked over to Louis. "Louis, it's too bad we can't help you with your dream. If only you were smaller less toothy. You could play jazz to adoring crowds without scaring them. Anyway enjoy your loneliness abenaza."

Tiana didn't look impressed. "Cute, but its not going to…." She saw Naveen wag a finger at her.

"Hey guys I just had a crazy idea what if I asked Mama Odie to turn me human?"

"Louis you are a genius." Naveen turned to Juliet and Clementine. "And I suppose you two could ask Mama Odie about the seven pure whatever it is that you're looking for too."

By this time Akio had gotten back into New Orleans and was approaching the LeBouff mansion. He saw a girl with short blond hair wearing a pink dress with a matching pink hat talking to a handsome young man with dark skin, but a nasally voice. Akio waited until he saw the blond girl walking away from the man before he began to walk over to her. "Excuse me Miss LeBouff, do you think I could talk to you for a minute?"

The girl turned around and was absolutely beaming. "Oh darling call me Charlotte." Her nose wrinkled for a minute. "Oh wait don't tell me you're that boy who wanted to dance with me all last night." She saw Akio shake his head and she squealed loudly. "I bet your can't guess what just happened to me."

"I bet you're right."

Charlotte squealed again and took Akio by the hands to dance him around. "I'm getting married. Prince Naveen proposed to me and we're going to have ourselves a Mardi Gras wedding." She squealed again before releasing her grip on Akio and prancing away.

Akio hadn't felt any warmth when he was around Charlotte and was feeling a little let down, but the name Naveen was sounding very familiar. He looked back over at the gazebo that Charlotte had come from to see an interesting scene. He saw that the handsome young man had disappeared and had been replaced with a short tubby man with grey hair who was currently talking to a tall sinister looking man.

"What do we do now," asked the tubby man as the taller of two grabbed something that was around his neck.

"Because someone let our froggy prince go Larry I'm reduced to asking for help from my friends from the other side."

Akio remembered hearing Tiana say that the other frog she was with had gotten into something with a voodoo witch doctor and this tall man had to be it. As quietly as he could he crept away from the gazebo and went back towards the outskirts of the city to re-enter the bayou.

Back in the bayou the group was making their way through the bayou as Tiana talked about her restaurant.

"Please stop you are making me so very hungry." As Naveen said this his long tongue shot out of his mouth.

Clementine giggled. "Letting your instincts take over are we."

"Interesting…." Naveen hopped off Louis's back and into the water swimming towards a group of moths.

"What are you doing? Tiana asked still from atop Louis's back.

"Shh you are frightening the food." Naveed shot his tongue out at the moths only to have it come back and slap him in the face. "This is harder than it looks." He tried again to catch a bug only to have his tongue land on a branch. The branch came back off its limb and smacked him in the mouth.

Tiana laughed as she watched a firefly land on a dandelion. Her tongue suddenly popped out of her mouth. "What? Oh, no no no no no. There is no way I'm kissing a frog and eating a bug in the same day." Instead of staying seated on Louis's back Tiana's tongue shot out again causing her to get up.

By this time Naveen had gotten the branch out his mouth and his tongue was also coming out of his mouth. Both of them were talking towards the dandelion. Their tongues collided at that moment getting their mouths stuck together.

Clementine burst out into laughter as Juliet snickered behind her. "This has got to be the funniest world I've ever been too."

"This is the only other world besides Atlantica that you've been too." Juliet mumbled under her breath.

From out of the bushes came Louis. "You all find anything to eat yet?" He saw Tiana and Naveen with their tongues tied together. "Oh my hang on old Louis has this figured out." Louis picked the two frogs up and pushed them together only to get them more tangled together. "You know what this needs? A sharp stick. Be right back."

Juliet leaned down and picked them up. "You two certainly are in a pickle." She looked them over to try and find a way to untangle them. "I can't find where you two are exactly tied together."

"Oh well lookie here." The firefly from before came flying down. "I guess you and you're boyfriend got a little carried away am I right?" This brought about much protest from both Tiana and Naveen.

"Let me shine a little light on the situation." The firefly tried and failed to light his bulb up. "Excuse me hang on." He shook himself a little more before he lit up. The firefly flew back down and squirmed between Naveen and Tiana before he was able to untangle them. "About time I introduced myself my name is Raymond, but everyone calls me Ray."

"Pardon me, but your accent is funny," Naveen said grateful to be untangled from Tiana.

"Well I'm a Cajun boy. Born and bred in the bayou you all must be new around here."

"Actually we're from a place far far away from this world," Naveen said.

"You all from Shriport?"

"No, no we are people."

Tiana thought it time for her to interject. "Prince charming here got himself turned into a frog by a voodoo witch doctor. And we were on our way to Mama Odie's to see-"

"Whoa, whoa whoa Mama Odie? You all heading the wrong direction. What kind of chuckle head told you to go this way?"

Juliet looked back at the bush that Louis had gone through just in time to see him come back.

"I found the stick!"

Tiana, Naveen, Juliet, and Clementine were giving Louis the stink eye as he brandished the stick.

"Louis, Ray says you've been taking us the wrong way," Tiana huffed.

"Well, I was confused by the topography and geography…."

Ray flew down close to Tiana to whisper to her. "First rule of the bayou never take directions from a gator. Why me and all my relations will help show you all the way."

Clementine clapped her hands in excitement as she watched a massive mass of fireflies fly over them glowing brightly against the dark sky. "Isn't it beautiful?" She saw that Tiana, Naveen, and Louis were going after the fireflies and hastily began to follow as well.

Juliet trudged behind a little bit slower than the rest of the group. She was a little flustered that she'd been to so many worlds already and had only found one of the seven pure lights. "I hope this Mama Odie really can help."

As Juliet and Clementine were making their way to Mama Odie's, Akio had followed both men from the gazebo outside the LeBouff mansion to a little building with the title Dr. Facilier's Voodoo Emporium above the door. He could hear a voice from the other side of the door and pressed his ear to it. _That has to be Dr. Facilier, but it doesn't sound like he's talking to his friend._

Inside the building Dr. Facilier was talking with his 'friends from the other side'. "Friends, I know I'm into you pretty deep already, but it seems our little froggy prince as lost his way and I need your generous assistance getting him back." His response was the sound of a garbled laugh. "Haha I hear you now what's in it for you all? Well, as soon as I dispose of Big Daddy LeBouff I'll rule this town. I'll have the entire city of New Orleans in the palm of my hand and you'll have all of the weak souls your dark little hearts desire." He blew the vision of the city out of his hand and up towards the masks that were hanging on the walls who smiled back down at him. "Oh, you love that don't you? So we got ourselves a deal?"

The main larger mask on the wall opened its mouth to release a hoard of spirits that cackled and giggled.

"Haha, now we're cooking we're going to find ourselves a frog. Search everywhere the bayou, the water, the town. Bring him to me alive. I need his heart pumping for now."

Akio had to step out of the way as the sprites began flooding out from beneath the doorway. "I knew it that voodoo doctor is the one who turned Naveen into a frog and now he's trying to get him back. I need to go warn them."

After Akio started looking for a way to get back into the bayou Juliet and Clementine were still with Tiana, Naveen, Louis, and Ray. They had stopped to eat some gumbo that Tiana had made before Ray looked up at the sky at something that was glowing.

"Oh, there she is. The sweetest firefly in all creation."

"Evangeline," Tiana asked.

Louis was still licking the inside of his bowl clean, but was able to get out what he wanted to say. "I wanna meet this girl. Where she at?"

Ray looked ecstatic as he drifted further up into the night sky. "How can you miss her? She glowing right in front of ya'll." He missed Tiana and Naveen looking between each other with their mouths open.

Clementine went to laugh when Juliet clapped a hand over her mouth.

Louis actually did laugh. "That isn't no firefly." He was shushed when Naveen threw something at him.

As Juliet and Clementine watched Tiana and Naveen dance on the lily pads Clementine tried to suppress a smile, but it was caught by Juliet.

"What are you smiling about?"

"I was just thinking that I wish Akio was here." She saw Juliet raise an eyebrow in confusion.

"Well, the two of you could be dancing out there too." This time it was Clementine who heard Juliet laugh. "It's not funny. The two of you look good together."

"That's funny….has anyone ever told you that you're funny Clementine?" From the corner of her eye Juliet saw a shadow creeping up behind Naveen, but it grabbed him by the ankle before she was able to summon her Keyblade.

The group chased Naveen as he called out to Tiana.

Juliet shot a beam of blizzard magic at one of the sprites causing it to disintegrate, but missed the one that was carrying Naveen.

From out of the darkness came several beams of light which took care of the rest of the shadows. Something was coming towards them from out of the darkness; a large hulking shadow.

"Not bad for a hundred ninety seven year old blind lady." The speaker was a short dark skinned woman wearing white robes with sunglasses holding a lit torch. "Now which one of you naughty children has been messing with the shadow man?"

Louis pointed at Naveen.

As they entered Mama Odie's house (a ship that was stuck up a tree) Tiana for the first time sounded relived. "We're so glad we found you Mama Odie, Ray and Louis have been telling us all about you and we've been traveling quiet a long ways and you can't imagine what we've been through and we-" She was momentarily distracted by the sight of a pair of eyes and teeth in two glass jars. "And we heard that you-"

Mama Odie choose to ignore Tiana and instead called out to her pet snake. "Juju? Come on over here you bad boy." She didn't seem at all nervous about a snake rubbing up against her. "Give us a little sugar now."

Clementine looked like she was going to be sick as Mama Odie began kissing the snake.

"You all just do as your Mama told you." Mama Odie took Juju by the neck and straightened him out so that he was like a cane. "Good to see you again Ray. How's your Grandma?"

"Oh she's fine. Got into a little trouble for flashing the neighbors again."

"I like that gal."

Once again Tiana was staring to get frustrated. "Mama Odie," she said before she and Naveen jumped onto the arm rest of the chair Mama Odie was now sitting in. "We don't want to take up too much your time-"

"Ya'll want some candy?" Mama Odie showed them a handful of rocks and other loose ends.

"No thank you."

"Ah that's too bad. This is a special candy." She popped one of the bobbles into her mouth. "Would have turned ya'll human." Mama Odie laughed at the sound of Tiana and Naveen sputtering in shock. "I'm just messing with ya'll."

Tiana brightened up considerably. "How did you know we wanted to be human?" Her response was snores.

Naveen a little hesitantly pocked at Mama Odie's sleeping form. "Mama Odie?"

"Juju! Why didn't you tell me my gumbo was burning?" She rushed over to a large pot.

Juliet looked over at Clementine with a skeptical look on her face. "Do you think we've come to the right place?"

"I think so. I've always heard the ones who are a little crazy are brilliant."

Tiana tried to interject, but instead had one of Mama Odie's' fingers shoved into her mouth.

"Taste this."

"Hit it hard with a couple hits of Tabasco and it's the bee's knees. Now-"

"Juju!" The snake popped up again with a jar of Tabasco in its mouth and poured in a couple drops.

Mama Odie stuck her finger in again and tried it. This time she seemed pleased and clapped her feet together. "Now ya'll figure out what you need?"

"Its just like you said Mama Odie we need to be human."

"Yah don't have the sense you was born with. Ya'll want to be human, but your blind to what you need."

Naveen spoke up this time. "What we want and what we need is all the same thing yes?" His response was a swift smack on the head.

"It's the same thing no. You listen to your Mama."

Clementine walked over to the gumbo pot just as Tiana, Naveen, and Mama Odie were walking away and looked in. "Do you think this is magic gumbo?"

Juliet walked over to Clementine's side and looked in as well. "What makes you say that? Doesn't look like magic gumbo. Looks like normal gumbo to me?" She saw Clementine lean further into the pot. "Don't do that you'll fall in."

They continued to look into the gumbo pot until Mama Odie came back with Tiana and Naveen. Juliet walked over to Mama Odie. "Mama Odie, I have a question for-"

"You want to know about the seven pure lights isn't that right, dearie?" She smiled when she saw Juliet nod. "Well, you want find any of them here, but I have a word of warning for you. Beware the darkness that has crept into your life. It has taken human form."

Juliet cocked her head to the side. "I know about Puck and Antonia already Mama Odie."

"Not the minions dearie their master is who you want to avoid."

Juliet dug into her mind to try and figure out if she knew anyone else that could be. "I don't know who you could be talking about, but thanks for the warning."

As they turned to leave (Tiana, Naveen, Louis, and Ray had already left) Juliet let out a sigh of frustration. "Well Clementine, let's go get Akio and head on to the next world." When she took a step something came up out of the ground reveling itself to be a sloth mole." She stomped down on its head. "What are wraiths doing here? I haven't seen any since we entered this world." Juliet summoned her glider and got onto it. "Come on I think its defiantly time for us to get out of here."

By the time they got back into New Orleans it was night time and Mardi Gras had started. Juliet and Clementine were walking through the heavily crowded streets as they searched for Akio as the obnoxiously decorated floats went down the streets.

Akio was also looking for Juliet and Clementine to tell them that he'd found out who had turned Naveen into a frog. He saw them through the hoards of people and waved over at them. "Juliet, Clementine I'm over here."

They quickly walked over to Akio. Juliet clapped a hand on his shoulder. "So did you find anything out?"

Before Akio was able to answer a float with Charlotte standing next to Naveen went past. He pointed up at the float. "That man isn't the prince. Dr. Facilier the voodoo doctor turned some other man into the prince and turned the prince into a frog."

Clementine looked back up at the float. "We met the real prince and he told us that some witch doctor turned him into a frog, but he didn't give a name."

Juliet was about to interject when she saw a familiar firefly fly past her face holding an amulet. "Ray? I think that's someone we know." She turned to go after him when she heard a roar and looked back to see Louis easily parting the crowd.

As they chased after Louis they came into a cemetery. Juliet saw Louis crouched down on the ground. "Louis what happened?" She looked over his shoulder to see Ray laying in Louis's claws.

"The voodoo man got Ray."

Juliet looked down at Ray to see that his bulb was just barely flickering. "Don't worry Louis we'll find this voodoo man. What did you say his name was Akio, Dr Facilier?"

As they got further into the cemetery Juliet saw Tiana hopping away from a tall man wearing a hat and a black jacket. "Akio, is that Dr. Facilier?"

"Yeah that's him."

Juliet shot a ball of fire magic hitting Facilier in the back of the leg. She gulped when she saw him turn around with a look of pure rage on his face.

"Just who do you think you are brat?" He swung his cane out at Juliet almost hitting her in the face.

Stumbling backwards Juliet swung her Keyblade out knocking the cane from Facilier's hand.

Behind Facilier was Tiana who had gotten a hold of the amulet. She watched the fight between Juliet and Facilier continue for a few more seconds before she took the amulet and slammed it down onto the concrete.

Facilier heard this and turned around just in time to see it smash to the ground. "No, no! How am I ever going to pay back my debt?" He was on his knees frantically trying to piece the amulet back together when he heard a noise behind him. The voodoo doctor looked back to see his friends coming down towards him from the head stones. "Friends…."

"Are you ready?"

"No I'm not ready at all. In fact I've got lots more plans."

"Are you ready?"

"This is just a minor setback in a major operation. As soon as a whip up another spell we'll be back in business. I still go the froggy prince locked away. I just need a little more time." He jumped as more of the shadows began to come up out of the ground one of them grabbing him around the ankle.

Juliet watched in horror as Facilier was dragged away disappearing into the mouth of one of his friends from the other side. "Well I guess that's all we can do in this world." She turned and began to walk away when she heard Tiana call out to her.

"Juliet, where are you going?"

"I'm not sure, but we'll find a place."

13


	12. Chapter 12

[A/N: I realize that the wait for this chapter was a lot longer than usual, but the site I was using for the Disney movies to get the dialog right went down and I've been looking for a new one. I found one not that long ago so the waits between chapters won't be months long anymore. I also started school last week so the chapters won't be posted as often, but you won't be having to wait a month for one either.]

The next world that they landed in was a thick lush forest. Juliet reached into her pocket and pulled out her map. "According the map we're in New World….that's really vague."

Akio peered over Juliet's shoulder to examine the map. "Maybe this world was newly discovered."

Juliet looked the map over flipping it over a couple of times. "I think this map is pretty old. I think all the worlds here were discovered a long time ago. Maybe the person who named the worlds wasn't very creative."

Clementine looked around the forest when she saw something white through the trees. "What's that?" She walked a little closer to the gap in the trees until she came to a rock that was jutting out and crawled out onto it. Clementine stood up all though with a little bit of wobble in time to see a large ship coming into the harbor. "That is one big ship." She stepped aside to allow Juliet and Akio to join her on the rock.

Nearly losing her balance Juliet hopped down off the rock into the ledge beneath it. "Whoever is on that ship might be able to tell us more about this world." The sound of someone walking behind them caused her to peek back around the rock.

Disappearing back into the woods was a tall young woman with dark skin and long black hair wearing some kind of animal skin dress. She looked hesitantly back at the trio.

Not waiting until Juliet or Akio could get back over the rock Clementine hopped down and began to walk towards the woman. "Who are you?" She had a good natured smile on her face and was trying to look friendly towards her. "I'm Clementine and this is Juliet and Akio."

The woman still looked a little confused, but slightly more comfortable. "Pocahontas."

Clementine looked back at Juliet and Akio in confusion. "Wonder what she means by that." She turned back to the woman. "Is that your name?" She saw the woman nod and gave a sigh of relief. "Well now that we're done with the introductions would you happen to know if New World is what this world is actually called or is it just a newly discovered world?"

Pocahontas nodded her head to the first question. "This land has been around for as long as I can remember. It is an old land." She saw the white peeking through the trees over the trio and walked over to the ledge to crawl on top to get a better look. "I wonder if those were the clouds Grandmother Willow was talking about." She looked around and saw a tall man wearing strange clothes with blond hair making his way through the trees. Pocahontas turned back to Juliet, Akio, and Clementine as she brought a finger to her lips.

"John, what are you doing up there?" Came a voice off in the distance.

"Getting a better look."

Juliet looked over at Pocahontas who was looking at the stranger with a smile on her face. _Wonder if they know each other._

Pocahontas's raccoon companion Meeko crawled out of their hiding spot and crawled towards the strange man while the humming bird Flit tried in vain to pull him back.

The stranger looked at Meeko and put his knife away before he kneeled down. "Well, you're a strange looking fellow. Are you hungry?" He reached into a pack at his waist and pulled out a cracker. "It's a biscuit." He handed it to Meeko who took it curiously. "Its food. Well sort of."

Meeko took one look at the biscuit before devouring it.

"Oh you like it. Well try eating it for four months straight."

Meeko took another biscuit and waved back at Pocahontas and the rest of the group.

"You got a friend back there?"

The stranger got off the tree he'd been standing on and walked over to the bush that they were hiding in, but as he pulled back the foliage Flit sprung out and began flying in his face.

"John, you better get down here the Governor is coming ashore."

John put his helmet back on as he backed away from Flit. "All right I'm leaving."

Waiting until John had left Juliet turned to Clementine. "Why don't you follow him?"

Clementine looked back over at Juliet with her mouth open. "Why me?"

"Because you can blend in. You've got blond hair and blue eyes just like him. The other people on that ship will probably think you came with them."

"My eyes are grey." Clementine could feel Juliet still staring at her. "Fine, fine I'll go." She slipped out of the bushes and began to creep after John trying to keep as quiet as possible.

Pocahontas turned to Juliet and Akio. "Do you think you're friend will be all right?"

Juliet nodded. "Yeah she'll be fine."

Pocahontas began to creep out of the bushes as well. "Come with me I'll take you to my Father."

In the Indian village in one of the huts an old man with long grey hair was standing in front of a fire. "These are not men like us. Strange beasts with bodies that shine like the sun and weapons that spout fire and thunder. They prowl the earth like ravenous wolves consuming everything in their path."

A strong looking young man spoke up as the smoke continued to fill the hut. "Great Powhatan I will bring out strongest warriors and we will destroy these visitors."

"Kokum in that battle we knew how to fight our enemy, but these pale visitors are strange to us. Take some men to the river to observe them. Let us hope they do not intend to stay."

By this time Clementine had reached where the ship was and was hiding in the trees as she watched a large man wearing purple plant a flag in the ground. "They don't look like Pocahontas. Maybe they're from another world too." She took a step forward when she saw a young man with red hair wearing a floppy hat look in her direction and she quickly ducked back into the trees.

As Pocahontas, Juliet, and Akio made their way back towards the village Pocahontas saw a shadow from the other side of a waterfall and silently crept towards the shadow. She motioned for Juliet and Akio to keep quiet and stay behind.

On the other side of the waterfall John was kneeling down with a handful of water cupped in his hands. He splashed the water onto his face when he thought he saw movement on the other side of the waterfall. Silently he moved into the shadows and readied his rifle. He waited until the person moved out from behind the waterfall before he jumped out with his rifle aimed at the figure. John stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of Pocahontas standing on a rock staring back at him. The way her long black hair blew in the wind casting a shadow over her dark eyes was entrancing.

They stood together in silence staring at the each other until John put the gun down and began to walk towards Pocahontas.

Pocahontas took off at a dead run with Juliet and Akio close in pursuit. She hopped into her canoe and was about to start off when John caught up to her.

"Please, don't run away. Its alright I'm not going to hurt you." He offered his hand to her. "Here, let me help you out of there."

Pocahontas said something unintelligible to Juliet, Akio, and John.

"You don't understand a word I'm saying do you?" He saw her look skeptically at his hand. "It's all right."

Juliet could hear some kind of strange singing in the trees as Pocahontas took John's hand and nudged Akio. "Did you hear that music?"

"I heard something, but I thought it was just the wind."

John looked relived when he heard Juliet and Akio speaking English before he turned his attention back to Pocahontas. "Who are you?"

"Pocahontas."

"What? What did you say?"

"My name is Pocahontas."

John looked like he was starting to visibly relax. "I'm John Smith."

While Juliet and Akio were getting acquainted with John Smith, Clementine was keeping an eye on the growing camp out in the harbor. She had decided that the portly man in purple called Radcliffe was the leader of the group. As she spied on the group she'd realized very quickly that they were looking for gold.

"That's it keep at it men." Radcliffe was getting dangerously close to Clementine's hiding spot which causing her to back up into the trees. "Keep digging it's got to be here somewhere."

Clementine very slowly inched out again in time to hear a red haired man with a beard start complaining.

"How long are we going to be keep digging, sir?"

"Aye we're busting our backs slaving away day and night." Agreed a dark haired man.

"For King and country I know and I share your fatigue."

Clementine had gotten up behind a tall skinny young man who was busy cutting bushes into different animal shapes when she heard Radcliffe call out to him and quickly disappeared again. She was about to go off to look for Juliet and Akio when she heard a sudden uproar….something about savages. Peeking out of the trees Clementine could hear Radcliffe berating the red haired young man with the floppy hat that she'd seen earlier.

Back with Pocahontas, Juliet, Akio, and John Smith, Pocahontas was examining the strange object that Smith would wear on his head.

"It's called a helmet."

"Helmet?" Pocahontas said back.

Flit flew up to the helmet and pecked at it angrily as his reflection grew.

Smith laughed as Flit bounced off the helmet. "So what river is this?"

Pocahontas said something in her own language that the rest of them couldn't understand.

"You have most unusual names. Chickahomenie. Pocahontas."

"You have the most unusual name….John Smith."

Smith turned to Juliet and Akio. "Who are you two anyway? You don't look like Pocahontas."

Juliet stretched and popped her back. "My name is Juliet and this is Akio." She decided to leave out that Clementine was out spying on his people.

"So you're not from around here are you?"

"No, we're from a place far away from here."

"Oh, you mean like London?" He saw Juliet and Akio shake their heads. "Spain?"

This time Juliet laughed quietly under her breath. "No, nothing like that. We're from another world." She saw John quirk an eyebrow.

Meeko took this opportunity to bury his face in Smith's bag in search of biscuits. The raccoon was seized by the tail and hoisted out of the bag.

"Is this bottomless pit a friend of yours?"

Pocahontas took the raccoon from Smith and held him upright. "Meeko," she scolded.

"Well how do you do, Meeko?" Smith held his hand out to Meeko who began to flip his hand over looking for more biscuits. Meeko thrusts John's hand back at him in disappointment.

"Its all right it's just a handshake." He offered his hand to Pocahontas who shrugged. "Here let me show you."

Pocahontas looked at Smith's hand in confusion. "Nothing's happening."

"No, I need your hand first."

Hesitantly, Pocahontas gave Smith her hand. After they released each other's hands Pocahontas looked like she was starting to relax. "This is how we say hello. Weengapo." She raised her arm and fanned it out over her head. She watched Smith copy back what she'd done. "And this is how we say goodbye. Aana."

"I like hello better." Smith put his hand up against Pocahontas's, but was sabotaged by Flit who put himself between them. "I remember you."

"Flit just doesn't like strangers."

"Well I'm not a stranger anymore." He tried to pet Flit only to be pecked at. "Why doesn't he act this way around them?" Smith gestured at Juliet and Akio who shrugged.

Meeko meanwhile had gotten back into John's bag and this time had resurfaced with a strange object in his mouth.

"Meeko, come back here," Pocahontas called after him.

"Don't worry he can't hurt it." Smith had to jump after Meeko who'd began to bang it on a rock.

Meeko ran up a tree where he continued to bang on the object.

"Meeko come down here." Pocahontas called up to the raccoon.

"All right keep it. Call it a gift."

Pocahontas looked up at Meeko in the tree in curiosity. "What was that?"

"It's called a compass."

"Compass?"

"It tells you how to find your way when you get lost." He looked over at Juliet. "Don't you two know what a compass is?"

Juliet shook her head. "We use the stars back home to find out way around."

Akio was also shaking his head. "My world considers compasses primitive."

"Its alright I'll get another one in London."

"London? Is that your village?"

Smith smiled as he looked up at the sky. "Yes, it's a very big village."

"What's it like?"

Smith turned his attention to Pocahontas. "Well its got streets filled with carriages and bridges over the rivers. Buildings are as tall trees."

Pocahontas gazed dreamily up at the big tree that they were seated under. "I'd like to see those things."

"You will."

"How?"

"We're going to build them here. We'll show you how to use this land properly how to make the most of it."

"Make the most of it?"

"Yes, we'll build roads and proper houses."

Pocahontas looked like she was starting to get cross with John. "Our houses are fine."

"You think that only because you don't know any better."

Now Pocahontas was cross. She got up from the grassy spot she'd been sitting in and began to walk away with Smith in pursuit. Getting into her canoe Pocahontas wasn't able to get very far before John had gotten in front of her to stop her boat.

"Wait, there's so much we can teach you. We've improved the lives of savages all over the world."

"Savages?!" Her voice had risen in her anger.

Smith could see Juliet and Akio giving him a hard look from back on the shore. "Not that you're a savage."

"Just my people."

"Listen that's not what I meant. Just let me explain."

Instead of listening to anything else Smith had to say Pocahontas tried to paddle around him. "Let go!"

"No. I' not letting you leave."

Not to be deterred Pocahontas jumped out of her canoe and crawled up into the tree that was overhanging the river.

"Savage is just a word. You know a term for people who are uncivilized." Smith was attempting very ungracefully to climb up after Pocahontas.

"Like me?" Pocahontas was hanging out of the tree.

"Well when I say uncivilized what I mean is-" The branch that John grabbed onto broke and he fell from the tree landing hard on his butt.

Pocahontas jumped down from the tree after him. "What you mean is not like you."

Smith saw Pocahontas's face suddenly grow tense. "What is it?" There was the distant sound of drums.

"The drums…they mean trouble. I shouldn't be here." Pocahontas tried to walk off again when Smith took her hand.

"When will I see you again?"

"I can't I'm sorry."

They were in each other's arms and looked like they were about to kiss when Pocahontas turned away.

"I have to go." She turned to Juliet and Akio. "The two of you had better stay here too." With that she headed back to her canoe to return home.

A few days later it was raining at the encampment. Clementine was headed back to look for Juliet and Akio when she heard a rustling coming from the other side of the wall that the settlers had put up. _I guess it couldn't' hurt to poke around a little in there._ Making sure no one was around she cast a gravity spell lowering part of the wall when she realized that someone was watching her.

It was the young red headed man with the floppy hat. He was staring at her wide eyes as if he'd never seen anything like her before. "What do you think you're doing?"

Clementine stood stock still for a few seconds before taking off at a dead run out of the encampment.

The young man shrugged and turned around to go back inside when he came face to face with a slobbering black dog with mad rolling eyes. He stumbled backwards and meant to shot it, but to his dismay the bullets when right through it.

Clementine heard a yell coming from the direction that she'd just came from and quickly turned around again. "What am I doing? He's probably just going to panic when he sees me. Oh, but if a wraith is attacking him I wouldn't feel right about just leaving him." Clementine stopped running looking quiet put out with herself before she decided it would be best to help him.

The young man had been thrown onto his back by the Anger Dog had had shot it in the mouth, but to no avail.

The wraith leaned down and was about to bite him when a bolt of lightning hit square in the back of the head.

Walking a little closer Clementine took the wraith by the scruff of the neck and pulled it off the young man. "Are you all right?" She saw him open and close his mouth several times like a fish out of water. "Well if you're all right then I'm going to go."

"Who are you?"

Clementine bit her lip. It wasn't like she could actually tell him that she was traveling with a Keyblade wielder and they were looking for the seven pure lights. "I'm a traveler like yourself."

"No, I mean your name." He took his hat off and offered his hand to her. "I'm Thomas."

She didn't bother to shake his hand. "Clementine." She began to walk off again when she heard Thomas call out to her.

"Why don't you stay here? You'll be safe from the savages."

"No thanks, I need to go look for my companions."

The next morning was when Clementine found Juliet and Akio still under the big tree where Pocahontas had left them. "You two have been here the whole time?" She saw them nod. "I've been looking everywhere I even went to the outskirts of the village that's here and nearly got an arrow stuck in my head."

Juliet laughed quietly. "So, did you find out anything?"

"Yeah, I found out there are wraiths here too." Clementine's face suddenly brightened up. "So, have you found any of the other seven pure lights?"

Juliet sighed under her breath and shook her head. "No, I was wrong about the only lead I had. She's really nice and her name is Pocahontas, but-"She quieted herself when she saw Pocahontas and John starting to come up the river bank.

Smith saw Clementine and smiled at her. "You don't look like Pocahontas. You must be with Juliet and Akio." He saw her nod before Pocahontas pulled him up into the tree.

Juliet motioned for Akio and Clementine to follow her up the tree.

"This place is incredible and to think we came all the way just to dig it up for gold."

"Gold? What's gold?" Pocahontas got up onto a stump to sit down.

"You know its yellow comes out of the ground it's really valuable."

A sudden look of realization came to Pocahontas's face. "Oh, here we have lots of it." She reached into her bag and pulled out an ear of corn. "Gold."

"No. Gold is this." Smith reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold coin.

"There's nothing like that around here." She reached for it only to have Meeko snatch it away.

"No gold?"

"Not that I've seen."

Smith chuckled to himself. "All this way for nothing. Those boys are in for a big surprise."

"Will they leave?"

"Some of them might."

Pocahontas looked around a little nervously. "Will you go home?"

Smith who'd been lying on the stump propped himself up. "Well its not like I have much of a home to go back to. I've never really belonged anywhere."

"You could belong here."

The familiar music began to blow there the tree's branches and leaves and if you looked carefully a face could be seen in the tree's trunk.

Smith was staring up at the tree in confusion. "What was that?"

"Did you see something?" Pocahontas made this sound like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"No, no I just I ah….I didn't see anything. Did I?"

"Look again."

As the face rematerialized in the tree's trunk the only one who seemed at all calm was Pocahontas while Smith, Juliet, Akio, and Clementine all stared up at it in shock.

"Hello John Smith." The tree's voice was calm and soothing.

"Pocahontas, the tree is talking to me."

"Then you should talk back."

"Don't be frightened young man. My bark is worse than my bite."

"Say something."

"What do you say to a tree?"

"Anything you want."

Smith who'd fallen backwards hesitantly got to his feet. "So…."

"Come closer John Smith." The tree used her leaves to push Smith closer to her. The tree peered at him with curious eyes. "He has a good soul and he's handsome too."

John looked like he was starting to relax. "Oh I like her."

"I knew you would."

The tree then turned her attention to Juliet who'd been quietly observing the situation. "Don't think I forgot about you Keyblade wielder. Come over here my eyes aren't what they used to be."

Juliet felt the tree's leaves pushing on her back as she walked closer. She could feel the tree looking down at her and looked elsewhere out of embarrassment.

"You're heart is strong, but I sense a dark presence looming over you."

Remembering Mama Odie's similar warning Juliet felt her blood ran cold. Maybe there was something to this warning after all.

"Smith! Smith, where are yah mate?"

"We can't let them see us."

The tree gestured to the other side of her trunk. "Over here." As the men neared their hiding spot the tree uplifted one of her roots and tripped them.

"Watch your feet you big oaf." Berated a man with black hair at his companion.

"It wasn't me it was the tree."

"Of course the tree just felt like lifting its roots." The black haired man looked behind him at the roots to see it going back down into the dirt.

They looked at each other before the black haired man spoke up again. "Let's get out of here."

The tree snapped both men in the backside prompting them to run off.

Smith peered around the side of the tree's trunk. "I'm glad you're on our side."

"There's still some snap left in these old vines."

"I better get back before they sent the whole camp after me."

"When will I see you again?"

"Come meet me tonight right here." He stroked her face tenderly before he began to walk away.

The tree watched him go. "Well, I haven't had this much excitement in two hundred years."

Pocahontas looked like she was having a crisis. "What am I doing? I shouldn't be seeing him again. I mean I want to see him again."

"Who wouldn't? I want to see him again."

"But still something inside is telling me it's the right thing."

"Perhaps it's your dream."

"Do you think he's the one the spinning arrow as pointing to?"

Juliet turned back to Clementine. "Why don't you follow Smith and go back to the encampment. You weren't seen were you?"

Clementine tried to look innocent, but nodded her head. "Some kid named Thomas saw me, but I don't think he'd tell anyone." She turned and began to go in the direction that Smith had gone.

Shortly after this Smith had reentered the encampment with Clementine following at a safe distance.

Radcliffe came hurrying out of his tent looking very annoyed about the whole situation. "Smith, where have you been?"

"I was out scouting the terrain, sir."

"Excellent. Then you must know the Indians whereabouts. We'll need that information for the battle."

"What battle?"

"We'll eliminate these savages once and for all."

"No, you can't do that."

"Oh can't I."

"Look we don't have to fight them."

Thomas looked both angry and confused. "John, what's gotten into you?"

"I met one of them."

"You what," asked the black haired man from before.

"A savage," asked Thomas.

"They're not savages. They can help us. They know the land. They can navigate the rivers." He was handed the ear of the corn by Meeko from his bag. "And look its food."

"What is it?" The red haired companion of the black haired man marveled as he looked at the corn.

"Its better then hard tack and gruel that's for sure."

Radcliffe stormed up to the John and grabbed the corn throwing it the ground. "They don't want to feed us you ninnies they want to kill us. All of us. They got our gold and they'll do anything to keep it."

"There is no gold."

"And I suppose your little Indian friend told you this. Lies lies all of it is lies. There's no room for their kind in civilized society."

"But this is their land."

"This is my land! I make the laws here and I say anyone who so much as looks at an Indian without killing them on sight will be tried and hanged."

Clementine had been listening to the upheaval and decided it wouldn't be safe to stick around since they might think she was an Indian and take a shot at her.

It was night by the time Pocahontas arrived back at Grandmother Willow's tree.

"The earth is trembling child what's happened?"

"The warriors are here."

At that moment Smith came up over Grandmother Willow's roots. He took her hands in his. "Listen, my men are planning on attacking your people. You've got to warn them."

"Maybe it's not too late to stop this. You must come with me and talk to my Father."

"Pocahontas, talking isn't going to do any good. I've already tried talking to my men, but something about this land has them spooked."

There was a strange howling coming from the distance and out of the shadows came a creature that was clumsily balanced on its hind legs, but its upper body looked like a tree stump.

Grandmother Willow turned to look at it. "That's the strangest creature I've ever seen."

The creature took a few more bumbling steps before tripling and rolling down a small hill. It flew off the edge of the hill and got stuck up a tree only to have a small dog shoot out of the bottom of the tree stump.

Smith caught the dog upside down. "Percy!"

Percy saw Meeko and imminently started barking at him leaping from John's hands.

"See what I mean? Those two sides want to fight nothing can stop them."

Meeko and Percy continued to chase and fight each other until Grandmother Willow raised her voice as Percy ran towards her.

"Alright that's enough. Now then there's something I want to show you." Using one of her long tendrils of leaves Grandmother Willow lightly touched the surface of the water causing it to ripple.

Pocahontas was staring at the water in wonder. "The ripples."

"What about them?"

"So small at first, but look how they grow, but someone has to start them." said Grandmother Willow.

"They're not going to listen to us."

"Young man, sometimes the right path isn't the easiest one." She moved the root that Smith had been sitting on causing him to slid down to Pocahontas. "Only when the fighting stops can you two be together."

"All right let's go talk to your Father."

Pocahontas threw her arms around John's neck as Grandmother Willow closed the curtain of leaves around Meeko, Percy, Flit, Juliet, and Akio.

"What do you think they're doing that we can't see?" Akio tried to peer through the leaves only to be smacked by Grandmother Willow. "Seriously though what could-" He was cut off by a high pitched screech and looked through the leaves to see a large Indian man tackling Smith to the ground while Pocahontas tried to pull him off. From the corner of his eye however he could see a small group of Wraiths making their way towards the commotion. He tapped Juliet on the shoulder and pointed over at them.

Juliet taking the hint crawled out from beneath the leaves to attack the Wraiths. As they battled the few Wraiths that had appeared the only thing that broke their concentration was the sudden blast of a gun going off. She looked back to see the Indian man falling to the ground; a wide eyed Thomas staring down at him.

"Is he?"

Pocahontas was kneeling down next to the Indian. "You killed him." She jumped up and had to be restrained by Smith. "He killed him!"

"Pocahontas, he was only trying to help."

There was the sound of more people coming and Smith looked angrily back at Thomas. "Thomas get out of here!" When he didn't see Thomas move was when Smith grew angry with him. "Get out of here!"

Thomas took off at a dead run nearly running into Clementine in the processes.

The Indians that came running out of the trees tackled Smith and began to lead him away as Pocahontas watched on in horror.

She walked over to the Indian who had been shot and kneeled down beside him waiting for someone to take him away.

Juliet waited until the Indians including Pocahontas had left before she turned to Akio and Clementine. "Who thinks its time we left? There's no sign of the any of the seven pure lights and it looks like there's going to be a war of some kind coming here pretty soon."

Akio looked around for a moment as if he was trying to find the right words for what he wanted to say. "I think we should stay just a little longer." He saw Juliet look at him in puzzlement. "I mean we've been here for so long already it couldn't hurt to help them with their problems."

Juliet took a moment to think this through. "I guess you're right, but whose side do we pick." She looked over at Clementine. "What were those settlers like?"

"Most of them were alright, but there's their leader this man named Radcliffe is just awful. I say we fight for the Indians."

"All right so we've picked a side now we just need to find out where their village is."

Back at the encampment Radcliffe was rallying the settlers for the coming confrontation. "I told you those savages couldn't be trusted. Smith tried to befriend them and look what they've done to him, but now I say its time to rescue our courageous comrade. At day break we attack!"

As Juliet, Akio, and Clementine were ready to start looking for the Indian village they heard the familiar voice of Pocahontas.

"They're going to kill him at sunrise Grandmother Willow."

"You have to stop them."

"I can't."

"Child, remember you dream?"

"I was wrong Grandmother Willow I followed the wrong path. I feel so lost."

Meeko struck with an idea crawled up into a hole on Grandmother Willow's trunk and after searching through feverishly for a few seconds crawled back down with something in his paws. He handed it to Pocahontas.

"The compass?" A sudden gust of wind caught Pocahontas by surprise and she looked back down at the compass. "The spinning arrow."

"It's the arrow from your dream."

"I was right. It was pointing to him." As the wind continued to blow the needle in the compass stopped facing the direction of the village. "Sunrise!"

"It's not to late child. Let the spirit of the earth guide you. You know your path child now follow it."

Deciding this was a good an idea as any Juliet, Akio, and Clementine took off after Pocahontas as she began to run back to the village.

Pocahontas was a much faster runner then Juliet, Akio, and Clementine and was able to reenter the village faster just in time to throw herself over Smith. "If you kill him you'll have to kill me too."

The chief looked like he was in complete shock. "Daughter, stand back."

"I won't! I love him Father."

Again the chief looked shocked.

"Look around us. Look at where the path of hatred has led us. This is the path I choose Father. What will yours be?"

The chief looked between his people who were ready with their bow and arrow to the settlers with their muskets. The wind began to blow again washing over the chief making him calm. "My daughter speaks with wisdom beyond her years. We have all come here with anger in our hearts, but she comes with courage and understanding. From this day if there is to be more killing it will not start with me." He turned to an Indian with a knife and gestured at John. "Release him."

Radcliffe looked enraged. "Now's our chance fire."

"No. They let him go." Piped up Thomas.

"They don't want to fight," said the black haired man.

"It's a trick don't you see? Fire!" When no one agreed Radcliffe snatched a gun. "Fine, I'll settle this myself." He aimed it at the chief and fired.

Smith seeing this happen jumped in front of the bullet and fell to the ground.

Radcliffe looked on in shock. Beneath his feet smoke began to swirl releasing several Wraiths.

Juliet jumped down from the cliff with her Keyblade raised. "So you're the cause the Wraiths in this world." She swung her Keyblade at Radcliffe only to be blocked by his sword.

"You cannot defeat me I will have my gold!" Radcliffe swung his sword at Juliet almost hitting her in the shoulder before it was thrust back at him.

The Keyblade came down hard on Radcliffe's hand knocking the sword from it.

The rest of the settlers took this opportunity to jump on Radcliffe with Thomas as the ring leader.

"Put him in chains."

"I'll see you all hanged for this!"

"And gag him as well."

Juliet took this moment to back away from the settlers as she rejoined Akio and Clementine. "You think he'll be all right? John I mean."

Akio looked back up the cliff. "Maybe if they can get him back to whatever world he came from he'll be all right."

Clementine didn't look at all nervous about the situation. "If he's anything like the rest of these settlers he'll be fine."

As she turned to walk away Juliet saw Pocahontas looking down at them. "I guess its time to move on. We didn't find anything here, but maybe in the next world we will."

Clementine looked up at Pocahontas who looked as though her heart would break. "Shouldn't we at least say goodbye?"

"What's the point in saying goodbye? We'll see them again."


	13. Chapter 13

[A/N: I'm not entirely pleased with how this chapter turned out, but I figured I better get a new chapter out soon. I promise the next chapter will be better, but please enjoy the chapter anyway. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney.]

Juliet cracked her eyes open. Her head was pounding. As her eyes adjusted to the semi darkness she could make out the outlines of Akio and Clementine lying not far from her. "Akio, Clementine are you guys alright?" They'd been going through space when Juliet had lost control of her glider and they'd ended up crashing into this dark world. She heard a collective groan as her answer. It felt like her clothes had changed; her legs and arms were bare. Pushing herself up from the rock she'd been leaning against Juliet saw a puddle and looked at herself in it to see that she was wearing a blue skirt that was long in the back and short in the front with a matching top with one shoulder strap. On her face were three blue stripes on her left cheek.

Akio came stumbling out of the darkness followed by Clementine. Their clothes had also changed. Akio was wearing an olive colored tank top with suspenders and trousers of the same color with boots. Clementine was wearing a dress the same shade of light blue as Juliet, but the stomach was cut out. On her stomach was a blue circle with little triangles around it making it look like a sun. Akio looked over at Juliet and felt his cheeks heat up. "So do you know where we are?"

Juliet went to reach into her pocket when she realized that her clothes had changed. "I don't have the map anymore so no I don't know where we are." She heard yelling off in the distance and turned to the direction that the noise was coming from. "I'm sure if we go to whoever is yelling they could tell us where we are."

They began to run after the noise coming out onto a cliff. Standing on the cliff's edge were two groups. One of the groups was wearing large masks.

"Holy cats who are these guys?" The speaker was a tall muscled grey haired man.

"They got to be Atlantians." This time the speaker was a tall scrawny looking guy with glasses.

"What? That's impossible," said a tall blond woman.

"I've seen this back in Dakota. They can smell fear just by looking at you. So keep quiet," said an old man who was missing teeth.

The leader of the masked people said something unintelligible.

"I think its talking to you." Muttered a small round man who was wearing goggles. He was pulling on the shirt of the tall scrawny guy.

Again the leader said something that no one could understand.

The scrawny guy began to speak in the same strange language to the leader prompting her to remove her mask. This time he said something in French to which the girl responded with gusto.

"They speak my language." This seemed to excite the little goggle wearing man. He motioned for the girl to lean down which she did. He whispered something to her which must have gotten her angry and she punched him in the face.

"I like her," said a muscled black man as he clapped.

"About time someone hit him I'm just sorry it wasn't me." The speaker this time was a girl in overalls.

The scrawny guy had noticed Juliet, Akio, and Clementine by this time. "The girls look like Atlantians, but you not so much." He was looking at Akio when he said this.

Juliet licked her lips a little nervously. "Well we're not Atlantians. We're not from here actually. My name is Juliet and this is Akio and Clementine."

"Well, I'm Milo and they are Cookie, Miss Packard, Audrey, Sweet, Vinny, Mole, Helga, and Commander Rourke."

"How do they know all these languages," asked Audrey.

"Their language must be based on a root dialect just like the Tower of Babel." Milo theorized.

Rourke put a hand on Milo's shoulder. "Well maybe English is in there somewhere." He took a step forward. "We are explorers from the surface world. We come in peace."

"Welcome to the city of Atlantis." The leader of the now unmasked people held her arms out gesturing at a city that was sitting atop a waterfall. "Come you will speak with my Father." She took Milo by the arm and began to pull him away.

As they crossed a bridge over a cavern of molten lava Akio turned to Juliet. "Do you have any kinds of good feelings about this place at all?"

"No, not yet, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. I mean we just got here." She turned to Clementine. "By the way Clementine did you change out appearances again?"

"It wasn't mean this time. Maybe you change appearances in some worlds, but not others."

Akio nodded in agreement. "Remember we changed when in Timeless River and that was before we met Clementine."

They soon entered a large throne room with a pond in the middle. Sitting across from the pond was an old man with a beard that went to the floor. The old man presumably the king began to talk to the girl who was the leader of the Atlantians in the same language.

Rourke unlike Milo wasn't kneeling. "Your majesty on behalf of my crew my I say it is an honor to be welcomed to your city."

Milo coughed to try and get Rourke's attention. "Um excuse me commander…."

The king turned his attention to Rourke. "You presume much if you think you are welcome here."

"Sir, we have come a long way looking for-"

"I know what you seek and you will not find it here. Your journey has been in vain."

"We are peaceful explorers' men of science."

"Yet you carry weapons." Even in his blindness the king had been able to see the pistol at Rourke's hip.

"Our weapons allow us to remove obstacles that we may encounter."

"Some obstacles cannot be removed with a mere show of force. Returned to your people you must leave Atlantis at once."

"Your majesty be reasonable."

Milo thought now would be a good time to pipe up. "Sir?"

"Not now son."

"Trust me on this we better do as he says."

Rourke turned back to the king. "May I request that we spend one night that would give us time to rest and resupply. Be ready to travel by morning."

The king took a moment to ponder this. "Very well. One night. That is all."

"Thank you your majesty."

As they turned to leave the king called out. "You…..key bearer come here a moment."

Juliet looked around the room when she realized that she was the one he was talking to and walked back over to him. "Your majesty?"

The king was kneeling down to sit back down on his thorn and it looked like it was taking a great effort for him to do so. "You possess a great strength, but the darkness is growing ever stronger. The dark man was here. He told me of your coming. The key will bring destruction to the worlds it visits you must leave as well."

Juliet remembering the warnings of Mama Odie and Grandmother Willow found herself believing the king. "I don't know what you mean by the key bringing destruction, but if you want us to leave I'll leave tomorrow with them if it's acceptable." She saw the king wave his hand in dismissal. "Kida thinks outsiders would be beneficial. I see them as dangerous."

Akio waited until Juliet was back before he whispered to her. "The king thinks we should leave too?"

"Yep and frankly now since that girl must be his daughter and I didn't get the feeling with her she must not be one of the seven pure lights and we should move on."

As they left the throne room Juliet saw Milo and Kida going off together. "Maybe we could poke around a little bit. I am curious about what that Rourke guy is looking for. I think it would be a good idea to follow Milo and Kida for a start."

Soon they were following Milo and Kida by crawling along a stone pathway under a small waterfall. They came out into a small underground room that was covered in vines.

"I have so much to ask about your world." Kida sounded more excited than both Akio and Clementine had been. "You are a scholar are you not? Judging by your diminished physic and large forehead you are suited for nothing else. What is your country of origin?" She took Milo's glasses from him and put them on. "When did the flood waters recede?"

"Wait a minute I got a few questions for you too. Let's just do this you ask one then I ask one then you then I then you then I."

"Very well what is your first question?"

"Well ok. How did you get here? I mean not you personally, but your culture. How did all of this end up down here?"

"It is said that the Gods became jealous of Atlantis. They sent a great cataclysm and banished us here. All I remember is the sky going dark and people shouting and running. Then a bright light like a star my Father said it called my Mother to it. I never saw her again."

"I'm sorry. If its any consolation I know how you feel I lost my-wait a minute wait a minute. Back up you remember because you were there? That would make you 85…..88 hundred years old."

"Yes?"

"Well, hey looking good." Milo cleared his throat looking a little nervous. "Do you have another question for me?"

"How is that you found your way to this place?"

"Well I'll tell you it wasn't easy. If it wasn't for this book we never would have made it." Milo reached into his bag and pulled out an old book which Kida almost imminently snatched up.

"Ok second question. It says your people possess a power source."

"You mean you can understand this?" Kida was flipping through the pages of the book.

"Yes I'm a linguist that's what I do. Now getting back to my question."

Kida thrust the book into Milo's face. "This you can read this?"

"Yes, yes I can read Atlantian just like you." Milo watched Kida study the book for a few seconds. "You can't can you?"

"No one can. This has been lost to my people since the time of the Maebelmoc."

"Oh great flood."

Kida pushed the book back onto Milo's chest. "Show me."

As Milo began to read realization came over Kida's face. "Follow the narrow passage there you will find the fifth marker."

"Yeah, yeah that's it. How was my accent?"

"Boorish, providential, and you speak it through your nose. Here let me show you something." She took Milo by the front of his shirt and pulled him over to something that was covered with a tarp. With flourish she pulled the tarp off to reveal a strange fish looking vehicle.

"Looks like some kind of vehicle."

"Yes, but no matter what I try it won't respond."

"Perhaps if-"

"Way ahead of you." Milo leaned down to examine the vehicle. "Let's see put crystal into slot."

"Yes, yes I have done that."

"Gently place your hand on the inscription pad."

"Yes."

"Ok did you turn the crystal one quarter turn back?"

"Yes."

"While your hand was on the inscription pad?"

"Ye—no…."

Milo chuckled under his breath. "Well there's your problem right there. That's an easy thing to miss. You deserve credit for even getting this far." He saw Kida put her hands on her hips in annoyance. "All right give it a try."

Kida put the crystal she was wearing around her neck into the hole on the vehicle while placing her palm on the inscription pad. Both her and Milo watched in awe as the fish vehicle began to glow blue and lifted off the ground.

"This is great. With this thing I can see the whole city in no time at all. I wonder how fast it goes." Milo had only put one his fingers on the inscription pad when the vehicle sprang to life and shot forward.

It bounced off the walls as it bounced around the room before crashing in a corner.

Milo looked sheepishly over at Kida. "So, who's hungry?"

Juliet turned to Akio and Clementine. "Let's go take a look around the city. Maybe we can find out something about whatever the king was talking about."

Akio had been thinking about what the king had said and couldn't make any sense of it. "I've been traveling with you for some time and I've never seen you bring any destruction of any kind. In fact you're the opposite of destruction. Maybe, maybe he knows something about the seven pure lights and he just doesn't want to tell us anything."

Clementine rolled her eyes. "You should hear yourself Akio. That sounds like something I would say."Her eyes went out of focus ever so slightly. "Actually that sounds like it might have something to it…..and here I am agreeing with you."

As they reentered the city Clementine noticed that Akio seemed to be giving Juliet quiet a lot of attention. She pretended to be more interested in a stall full of strange looking food. "I think I'll give you two some alone time."

Juliet looked back at Clementine with a confused look on her face. "Why would we want to be alone?" She turned back to Akio. "We were just going to go see the king to see if he can tell us anything about the seven pure lights."

Clementine felt her face go red. "Oh is that all? I guess I could go with you if that's all you're going to do."

Approaching the throne room of the king Juliet noticed the absence of guards and peeked through to see the king still seated on his throne all thought he was slouched over. "It looks like he could be sleeping maybe we should come back later."

"Come closer key bearer." This came out in a hoarse whisper.

Juliet pushed the doors open and began to walk through when she heard the king speak again.

"Your friends must wait outside."

Akio and Clementine looked between each other before taking a step back. Akio looked over at Clementine with a trace of worry on his face. "What do you think he's going to tell her that we can't hear?"

"Hopefully it will something helpful with looking for the seven pure lights."

Juliet found herself still standing at the far side of the room while the king stayed seated on his throne. She could feel him staring at her with blind milky eyes and shifted her weight from foot to foot. "What do you want to talk to me about?"

"You were the one who came to me. Tell me key bearer what is it that you seek?"

Biting her lip as she tried to find the right words Juliet took a couple of steps forward. "Your highness, do you know anything about the seven pure lights?"

The king didn't look at surprised at her question, but propped himself up a bit more. "The seven pure lights have been sought after for many years by the darkness in order to fulfill its purpose. What would you do with them?"

She hadn't really thought about why Erik wanted to find the seven pure lights besides bringing the darkness to an end. "So the darkness can be stopped. Isn't that reason enough?"

The king staggered to his feet. "You do not look for the seven pure lights for yourself? You do think you do it for someone else, but the one who wish to help has evil intent."

Juliet raised an eyebrow when she realized that he was talking about Erik. "I don't know what you're talking about, but-" She was interrupted by an explosion that came from the entrance to the throne room.

Standing on the other side of the destroyed doorway was Vinny and Cookie who stepped aside to reveal that Helga had Kida in a strong armed grip.

"Tell them to drop their weapons….now!" Helga waited until the king had given the order before turning back to the rest of the crew. "Spread out search everywhere."

Rourke had Milo by the front of his shirt. "You've got to apply yourself son you've got to be missing something."

"Well there isn't. It just says the heart of Atlantis lies in the eyes of our king."

"Well maybe old king Cole can help us fill in the blanks." Rourke released Milo and walked up the king. "How about it chief where's the crystal chamber?"

"You will destroy yourselves."

"Maybe I'm not being clear." Rourke balled up his hand into a fist before punching the king hard in the stomach.

Sweet leaned down to examine the king. "Rourke, this was not part of the plan."

"Plan's change, doc. I suggest you put a band-aid on that bleeding heart of yours it doesn't suit a mercenary." Rourke walked up to the King's throne and sat down knocking over a bowl of fruit. "Well as usual diplomacy has failed us. Now I'm going to count to ten and you're going to tell me where the crystal is." Rourke cocked his gun and aimed it at the king. "One….two….nine…." A sudden look of realization came over Rourke's face as he gazed at the pool behind the king. "The heart of Atlantis lies in the eyes of our king. This is it we're in." He tossed the book he'd been holding back at Milo.

"Rourke, for the last time you've got to listen to me. You don't have the slightest idea what this power is capable of."

Helga had released Kida and was going after Rourke. "True but, I can think of a few countries who'd pay anything to find out."

Rourke stepped into the middle of the pool to have it start sinking down.

The platform sank down into the underground until it stopped before another larger pool of water. Above it was a ball of light that was surrounded by giant stone masks.

"Jackpot," exclaimed Rourke.

The group was staring up at the crystal in awe.

Kida felt her chest tighten as she stared up at the crystal. "Kings of our past." She collapsed to the ground in prayer.

Rourke was unmoved. "Thatch, tell her to wrap it up we got a schedule to keep."

Milo looked over at Helga who was looking down at Kida. He stooped down and touched Kida's shoulder. "Um Kida….I'm sorry." This seemed to snap her out of the trance she'd been in.

Rourke walked up to the water's edge and kicked a pebble into the water. He looked up to see the crystal begin to glow an angry red.

"Come on let's get this over with. I don't like this place." Helga was looking around nervously.

"All right Thatch what's next?"

As Milo spoke to Rourke, Kida saw the crystal around her neck begin to glow and lift off her chest. Her eyes began to glow as she began to walk towards the pool.

Milo tried to walk after her, but was stopped by Rourke who put his hand up.

"What's happening?"

"All it says is that the crystal is alive I don't know how to explain it. It's their deity."

As Milo and Rourke continued to argue Kida turned to face them; her eyes glowing white. "All will be well. Don't be afraid Milo Thatch." She said this in Atlantian.

Rourke was staring at Kida with his mouth open. "What did she say?"

"I don't know I didn't catch it."

Kida turned around again and began to walk out onto the water. She stopped when she went under the crystal. The light above her narrowed down until it was directly above her and enveloped her whole body. Kida began to lift off the ground slowly drifting up into the crystal until she disappeared. The crystal began to glow brighter and spin faster. After a few seconds the stone masks around the crystal began to slow down; the crystal growing smaller and more humanoid in shape.

The crystal figure began to sink back down to the water.

Milo went to go towards the figure when Rourke put a hand on his shoulder.

"Hold your horses lover boy."

As the crystal figure began to walk towards them the stone masks began to fall into the water.

Rourke put a hand out when Milo gestured for him to stop.

"Don't touch her."

As they returned to the surface Rourke had Audrey lock the now crystallized Kida into a vault.

Juliet looked over at the vault as she tried to peek through the little window. "What happened to her?"

"Somehow she joined with the crystal." Was Milo's response. He turned to scowl at Audrey who scowled right back at him. "So I guess this is how it ends. Fine you win. You'll be wiping out an entire civilization, but hey you'll be rich. Congratulations Audrey, I guess you and your Dad will be able to open that second garage and Vinny your family will be able to open a whole chain of flower shops. Because that's what it's all about money."

Rourke jumped out of the truck he'd been in. "Get off your soap box Thatch you've read Darwin its natural selection we're just helping it along."

"Commander, we're ready," shouted Helga from atop the truck.

"Yeah give me a minute. I know I'm forgetting something got the cargo, the crystal, the crew. Oh yeah…." He swerved around and punched Milo in the jaw sending him to the ground. "Look at it this way son you're the man who discovered Atlantis and now you're part of the exhibit." Rourke turned and began to walk back to the truck. "Let's move people."

"That was an order not a suggestion," barked Helga. "Let's go."

Audrey looked like she was going to start the truck for a minute before she sighed in defeat and kicked the door open. In a huff she got up and stomped over to Milo to help him up. She turned angrily to the rest of the group. Slowly, but surely the rest of them began to walk over to where Milo and Audrey were.

"We're all gonna die," remarked Mss Packard.

"Oh you can't be serious." Rourke looked at the group in his rear view mirror.

"This is wrong and you know it," snapped Audrey.

"We're this close to our biggest payday ever and you pick now of all times to grow a conscious."

"We've done a lot of things we aren't proud of robbing graves, plundering tombs, double parking, but no one got hurt. Well maybe someone got hurt, but no one we knew." Vinny was listing these things off on his fingers.

"If that's the way you want to do it fine. More for me."

Milo looked back at the Atlantians who'd been watching the whole ordeal; the light from the crystals around their necks was going dim.

"We can't let them do this."

Vinny grabbed Milo by the arm. "Wait a second."

There as an explosion and a few seconds later the bridge connecting the city to the island on the other side was collapsing into a lake of molten lava.

"Ok, now you can go."

"Milo, you better get up here," called Sweet off in the distance.

Juliet, Akio, and Clementine followed Milo back into the king's throne room.

"How's he doing," asked Milo.

"Not good I'm afraid. Internal bleeding. Nothing more I can do."

"What a nightmare and I brought it here."

"Now don't go beating yourself up. He's been after that crystal since Iceland."

A sudden look came over Milo's face. "The crystal! Sweet that's it. These crystals have some kind of healing energy I've seen it." He jumped when he felt the king's hand go over his.

"No, where is my daughter?" He heard Milo stutter. "She has been chosen like her Mother before her. In times of danger the crystal would choose a host of royal blood to protect itself and its people. It will accept no other."

"Wait a minute choose? So this thing is alive?"

"In a way the crystal thrives on the collective emotions of those who came before us. In return it provides power and longevity. Power, as it grew it developed a conciseness of its own. In my arrogance I sought to use it as a weapon of war, but its power proved too great to control. It overwhelmed us and caused our destruction."

Milo looked like he was in shock. "That's why you hid it beneath the city. To keep history from repeating itself."

"And to keep Kida from suffering the same fate as my beloved wife."

"What do you mean? What's going to happen to Kida?"

"If she remains bonded to the crystal then she could be lost forever. The love of my daughter is all I have left. My burden would have become hers when the time was right." With the last of his strength the king removed his crystal from around his neck. "Now it falls to you." He handed the crystal to Milo. "Return the crystal. Save Atlantis. Save my daughter." The king's hand slid from Milo's and fell to his chest. He lay still.

Sweet put his stethoscope back into his bag. "So, what's it going to be?"

"Excuse me?"

"I followed you in I'll follow you out. It's your decision."

"My decision? Let's review how effective my decisions have been. Let's recap: I lead a band of plundering vandals to the greatest archeological find in recorded history, thus enabling the kidnap and or murder of the royal family, not to mention delivering the most powerful source known to man to a mercenary nut case who's probably going to sell it to the Kaiser. Have I left anything out?"

"Well you did set the camp on fire and drop us down that big hole."

Milo threw his hands up. "Thank you…thank you very much."

"Course it's my experience when your this far down the only place to go is up."

"Who told you that?"

"A fellow by the name of Thaddeus Thatch."

Milo looked down at the crystal with a renewed determination on his face and marched out of the throne room.

"Where are you going," asked Audrey as she watched Milo stomp out.

"Going after Rourke."

"Milo that's crazy," retorted Audrey.

"Didn't say it was the smart thing, but it is the right thing."

Juliet found herself going after Milo when she felt Akio grab her arm.

"What are you doing? Shouldn't we just get out of here while we have the chance?"

"Why and miss out on all the excitement that's going to happen? This Rourke guy deserves to go down and I want to help Milo do it."

Audrey sighed under her breath. "Come one we better go before he hurts himself."

They got down to where Milo was in time to see him crawling onto one of the fish vehicles.

"Milo, what do you think you're doing," asked Audrey.

"Just follow my lead."

Juliet crawled up onto another one of the vehicles and was followed by Akio and Clementine. "It's a good thing these things are big or all three of us wouldn't be able to sit on one."

"Well I'm impressed." Mss Packard didn't sound very impressed.

"Its simple all you got to do is-"

"Yeah yeah I got it." Audrey had crawled onto the back of Milo's vehicle and put her hand on the inscription pad. The vehicle jerked and shot backwards knocking into a wall.

"Gently."

"Hey Milo, you got something sporty like a tuna?" Vinny called up.

"How is this done," asked an Atlantian guard.

"All you gotta do is use the crystal. Kida showed me." Milo walked over to a hammerhead shark and put his crystal in the slot before turning it a quarter turn left with his hand on the inscription pad.

As the vehicles began to take off Milo started his speech. "All right we're going to rescue the princess, we're going to save Atlantis, or we're going to die trying."

Juliet felt Akio tighten his grip around her waist. "Are you doing alright back there?" Her response was an enthusiastic whoop from Clementine and a groan from Akio.

As they flew over Rourke and the rest of the mercenaries Juliet and Clementine began shooting fire, blizzard, and thunder magic at them while Akio threw his disk.

Down at the bottom of the balloon Audrey was trying to cut the cut chain that was holding Kida to the balloon when Helga released a missile to drop on them.

"All right Milo any last words? Yeah I really wish I had a better idea than this." Milo brought his shark vehicle down close to the balloon when he noticed that Juliet was flying close behind him. "You be my backup." He saw her give him the thumbs up. Milo swerved and jumped off the vehicle just as it crashed into one of the balloons.

Juliet followed suit, but had to do likewise a safe distance away so that her vehicle wouldn't crash.

Rourke noticed this almost imminently. "We're losing altitude lighten the load."

Helga threw a canister off the balloon. "That's it unless someone wants to jump." She saw Juliet from the corner of her eye and suddenly threw her foot out to try and kick her off. "Never mind I think I found something else to get rid of."

Juliet blocked the kick with the Keyblade and successfully knocked Helga off balance.

This time instead of kicking Helga tried to punch Juliet just barely missing her cheek. "Why don't you just quiet while you're ahead little girl." She pushed some of her blond hair from her face; a smug sneer on her lips.

Rourke seemed to be board of the fight between Helga and Juliet and took Helga by the shoulders. "Ladies first." He threw her over the side of the balloon.

Helga thanks to her cat like reflexes was able to grab onto a support beam on the bottom of the balloon and swing herself back up again kicking Rourke in the jaw in the processes. "You said we were in this together." Another kick. "You promised me a percentage." When she went to kick Rourke again he grabbed her foot.

"Next time get it writing." With a thrust of his arm he knocked her from the balloon. "Nothing personal."

Milo came swinging down at that moment and kicked Rourke in the head sending them both falling down to a lower level of the balloon.

Rourke recovered quicker. "Well I've got to hand it to you you're a bigger pain in the neck then I thought was possible."

Milo tried to punch Rourke only to have his fist thrown back in his face and fell even further.

"I consider myself an even tempered man. It takes a lot to get under my skin, but congratulations you just won the solid gold kewpie doll."

Down on the ground Helga was rolling onto her back and reaching into her back pocket. She pulled out a gun and aimed it at the balloon. "Nothing personal." With the last of her strength she fired it sending a flare up at the balloon hitting it dead on.

Rourke saw the break in case of emergency box with an axe in it and broke it. He swung the axe at Milo's head who was able to duck in time. "Tired Mr. Thatch? That's a darn shame." The axe came down again breaking the glass of Kida's compartment.

Milo saw this and broke off a piece before Rourke seized him around the neck and lifted him into the air. Quickly before Rourke was able to do any more damage Milo cut the commander across the arm with the glass.

Juliet jumped down in time to see crystals working their way up Rourke's arm as he tried in vain to push them away. Thinking it was safe she turned back to Milo with a relieved look on her face.

"Thank heaven." Milo was also looking relieved until Rourke's crystallized arm came up and grabbed at the bracing that Milo had been on.

Juliet swung the Keyblade at Rourke's head hitting him in the temple.

In a rage Rourke turned to her to attack, but as he did so the propellers that were above him were knocked loose and beat him in the head sending shards of crystal everywhere. Some of them hitting the chain that had Kida's compartment.

Milo, Juliet, and Kida's compartment fell off the balloon landing hard on the ground; Milo rolling extra far and hitting his back against the compartment. A fire ball was coming down after them prompting Milo to push the compartment as quickly as he could.

"The volcano she awakes," exclaimed Mole.

"Hey I had nothing to do with it." Vinny doused the explosive he'd been holding.

"This would be a good place not to be," Cookie remarked.

"No we have to get her back or the whole city will die." Milo attached a chain to Kida's vault.

"And if we don't get out of here we'll die." Audrey grabbed the chain from Milo and tossed it up to Vinny who attached it to his vehicle.

"It's the only way to reverse this just do it."

As they took off the chain on Kida's end broke. Milo quickly hopped off the vehicle and rewrapped the chain around the body of the vault before climbing on top of it.

Following the rest of the group out of the volcano Juliet pulled their vehicle up higher until they were flying over Atlantis. "I think this would be a good time for us to leave. There are no seven pure lights here and…." What the king had said was still bothering her. "They'll be all right they probably have some trick up their sleeve to get out of this mess."

As they flew off they were able to see giant stone statues coming out of the water and forming a shield around the city. The light that was coming from the crystal was blinding as they left the world.


End file.
